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Twig Dieback Affecting Alabama Peaches

Twig Dieback Affecting Alabama Peaches

There are some things that may be sweet as a peach but seeing a peach crop affected by twig dieback is not one of them. There are various plant diseases that can cause the twigs, branches and shoots of a peach tree to die. Alabama Cooperative Extension System Plant Pathologist Ed Sikora offers information about what causes twig dieback, its symptoms and how to manage the disorder in peach trees.

Causes

Twig dieback is often the result of one of two diseases: bacterial blight or blossom blight. According to Sikora, these two common plant diseases are active every spring. Bacterial blight, often referred to as bacterial twig blight or dieback, is a bacterial disease that can cause dieback of twigs. Also known as brown rot, blossom blight –caused by a fungal pathogen– is a fruit tree disease that can also cause twig dieback in the spring, as well as fruit rot later in the season.

Symptoms

Sikora said it is difficult to determine which disease is present by symptoms alone.

“Symptoms of both diseases can appear early in the spring as the collapse of flowers,” Sikora said. “Flowers can turn brown and a gummy ooze exuded from the bark of infected trees, causing the dead flowers to stick to the twigs.”

Infected leaves can dry up and cling to their sticky branches. Cankers can also develop at the base of the leaf buds and flowers. Especially in the spring, gummy sap can often be found exuding from these cankers.

During wet weather, brown-to gray spores of blossom blight can appear on dead flowers, indicating the fungal disease is the cause and not bacterial blight. If these spores are lacking, however, the Auburn University plant diagnostic lab can confirm which disease is the culprit.

According to Sikora, trees that are growing under stressful conditions are more susceptible to both of these diseases.

Weather conditions often dictate the prevalence of these diseases. If weather is cool and wet, bacterial blight thrives. Blossom blight is more common with warm, moist weather.

Management

Removing infected twigs from infected trees is the first step in management of twig dieback. Sikora advises pruning out affected tissue during dry weather to avoid the spread of bacterial blight, blossom blight or other pathogens. Disinfecting pruners between trees is also critical in stopping this spread. To properly do this, soak the pruners in a 70 percent alcohol solution or a 10 percent bleach solution.

Later in the season, untreated blossom blight can lead to fruit rot, also known as brown rot. Once this occurs, it is crucial to remove and destroy all the affected fruit from the ground to reduce the spread of the pathogen.

“If affected fruit remains on the ground, fungal spores produced on the fruit surface can spread to healthy fruit in the tree,” Sikora said.

Brown rot can continue post harvest and spread among recently picked fruit. This can make for a frightful basket of peaches for the whole family.

Source : aces.edu

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Moving Ag Research Forward Through Collaboration

Video: Moving Ag Research Forward Through Collaboration



BY: Ashley Robinson

It may seem that public and private researchers have different goals when it comes to agricultural research. However, their different strategies can work in tandem to drive agricultural research forward. Public research may focus more on high-risk and applied research with federal or outside funding, while private sector researchers focus more on research application.

“For me, the sweet spot for public private sector research is when we identify problems and collaborate and can use that diverse perspective to address the different aspects of the challenge. Public sector researchers can work on basic science high risk solutions as tools and technologies are developed. They then can work with their private sector partners who prototype solutions,” Mitch Tuinstra, professor of plant breeding and genetics in Purdue University’s Department of Agronomy, said during the Jan. 10 episode of Seed Speaks.

Public researchers they have the flexibility to be more curiosity driven in their work and do discovery research. This is complimentary to private research, which focuses on delivering a product, explained Jed Christianson, canola product design lead for Bayer CropScience, explained during the episode.

“As a seed developer, we worry about things like new crop diseases emerging. Having strong public sector research where people can look into how a disease lifecycle cycle works, how widespread is it and what damage it causes really helps inform our product development strategies,” he added.

It’s not always easy though to develop these partnerships. For Christianson, it’s simple to call up a colleague at Bayer and start working on a research project. Working with someone outside of his company requires approvals from more people and potential contracts.

“Partnerships take time, and you always need to be careful when you're establishing those contracts. For discoveries made within the agreement, there need to be clear mechanisms for sharing credits and guidelines for anything brought into the research to be used in ways that both parties are comfortable with,” Christianson said.

Kamil Witek, group leader of 2Blades, a non-profit that works with public and private ag researchers, pointed out there can be limitations and challenges to these partnerships. While private researchers are driven by being able to make profits and stay ahead of competitors, public researchers may be focused on information sharing and making it accessible to all.

“The way we deal with this, we work in this unique dual market model. Where on one hand we work with business collaborators, with companies to deliver value to perform projects for them. And at the same time, we return the rights to our discoveries to the IP to use for the public good in developing countries,” Witek said during the episode.

At the end of the day, the focus for all researchers is to drive agricultural research forward through combining the knowledge, skills and specializations of the whole innovation chain, Witek added.

“If there's a win in it for me, and there's a win in it for my private sector colleagues in my case, because I'm on the public side, it’s very likely to succeed, because there's something in it for all of us and everyone's motivated to move forward,” Tuinstra said.