Can frost events trigger fire blight? Frost injury is considered a fire blight “trauma event”, but very little is known or published about exactly what conditions are required to trigger fire blight during a frost event. Because frost was widespread … Continue reading
The extended wetting periods and cool cloudy weather we are experiencing in the lower Hudson Valley as trees are approaching petal fall create unusually high risks for quince rust, Botrytis infection, and fruit marking from phytotoxicity. Special cautions are advised. … Continue reading
Note: This article was first published in Scaffolds Fruit Journal 29:1 (23 March 2020) but some of the hyperlinks in that article did not function correctly. Attention to a few disease-control details in early spring can make life easier through … Continue reading
New publications during the past year include a Scaffolds article on herbicide management and a Fruit Quarterly article on rapid apple decline. Causes of rapid apple decline are complex and difficult to decipher. The articles can be accessed via the … Continue reading
In previous commentary, fungicides recommended for control of bitter rot in the Northeast included captan, ziram, and QoI fungicides, but continued dependence on the latter is probably neither sustainable nor advisable. Read my recent article published in Scaffolds Fruit Journal for the rationale … Continue reading
RIMpro is a proprietary interactive decision support system that can help fruit growers manage apple scab and fire blight in spring. I discussed RIMpro briefly in a blog post last year. I have evaluated RIMpro for three years and have … Continue reading
Apple growers and extension specialists in northeastern North America are seeing an alarming increase in the numbers of orchards, mostly young orchards, where trees are declining or dying due to dysfunctional trunks. The phenomenon has been named sudden apple decline (SAD) … Continue reading
Bitter rot is an increasingly important disease of apples and pears in many production regions around the world. This post provides a link to a review of the scientific literature on bitter rot that I recently completed and that formed the basis for … Continue reading
Tuesday evening, May 3rd: Hudson Valley fruit growers should be thinking very carefully about their disease control strategies for the next few days. The good news is that the weather is too cool for fire blight to be a concern … Continue reading
Given that apples and pears are blooming again in the Hudson Valley, it’s time to think about fire blight. The primary risk from fire blight occurs during bloom, as everyone should know by now. The fire blight bacterium, Erwinia amylovora, … Continue reading
In addition to cold injury from our current cold snap, a scab infection period may arrive in the Hudson Valley with the warm rains predicted for Thursday. (No the snow did NOT kill the scab spores, and yes, the spores … Continue reading
The predicted scab infection risk for April 1-3 has diminished somewhat, but caution is still advised. Below are the RIMpro graphs for the two systems that I described in a post yesterday morning that was titled “Weather or Not.” The RIM … Continue reading
The scab infection risk for April 1-3 in the lower Hudson Valley may be waning, although caution is still advised. As suggested in my earlier post this morning, weather predictions that vary widely for events that are three or four days … Continue reading
The first scab infection period of the year may occur later this week in the Hudson Valley, but the probabilities of that happening depend on which weather forecast you prefer to believe. The weather variable is the critical factor regardless … Continue reading
Rains today (March 10th) pose no threat for apple scab in the Hudson Valley because we still do not have any green tissue on apples buds. According to one degree-day model*, McIntosh can be expected to reach the green tip bud … Continue reading
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