How to process apple trees, pears and other plants from scab

What is dangerous scab

Most often, scab affects apple and pear trees, but it also occurs on other fruit trees - peach, apricot, plum, cherry and sweet cherry, as well as gooseberries, currants, potatoes and beets.

This fungal disease can significantly reduce the amount of the crop and spoil its appearance. Fruits, berries, tubers and root crops infected with scab are not suitable for long-term storage and begin to rot very quickly.

How to understand that scab is on plants

Symptoms of scab on apple trees, pears and other trees are similar. The leaves on the underside are first covered with yellowish spots with a fuzzy contour, which gradually darken, grow and turn into a crust. Subsequently, the foliage may completely fall off. Flowers and ovaries dry up and fall off, and infected fruits become covered with dark velvety spots and become ugly. Sometimes, diseased trees may even dry up shoots.

The leaves of gooseberries and currants affected by scab are covered with velvety olive spots, which gradually darken, and the fruits become brown. In advanced cases, shoots begin to dry in shrubs.

Scab on potatoes affects tubers. They are covered with cracks, dark crusts, scabs or wart-like growths.

In rare cases, twisted leaves on potato bushes will tell about the infection. But basically, the presence of scab can be found out only when harvesting. And this applies to both potatoes and beets, the roots of which are also covered with crusts and scabs. Unfortunately, the only way to control scab on these crops is prevention, that is, preliminary treatment tubers and seeds with antifungal drugs before planting.

What you need to remember when dealing with scab

• Trees and shrubs can be cured by spraying with antifungal agents. for potatoes and beets, as we said above, only prevention is suitable.
• Treat trees and bushes in the morning or evening so that the solution does not burn the leaves under the influence of sunlight.
• Check the weather forecast and make sure there is no rain for the next couple of days. It is important that the agent is not washed off with water and that it has time to act.
• Try to apply the solution evenly throughout the plant, spraying the mixture from top to bottom and trying to hit both the outer and inner surface of the leaves. Also process the trunk, branches, ovaries and the ground in the near-stem circle.
• Dried branches on trees and bushes should be cut with a sharp pruner and then burned. It is also worth collecting fallen diseased leaves and ovaries and destroying them.
• Ripe fruits affected by scab, berries, tubers and root crops can be eaten. True, it is better to pre-peel them from the peel or plaque.

How to process apple trees, pears and other trees and shrubs from scab

Means for the treatment of trees and shrubs from scab will be the same.

Special preparations

In stores and garden centers you can find antifungal agents - fungicides. There are chemical preparations (for example, "Skor", "Horus", "Topaz", "Kaptan", "Strobi", "Rayok", 1% solution of Bordeaux mixture) and biological ones ("Fitosporin", "Fundazol", " Alirin-B”). Consumption rates and methods for preparing the solution vary depending on the manufacturer and are indicated in the instructions. You can also find the required dosage for each culture there.

In total, trees and bushes need to be sprayed with fungicides three times:

1. Approximately 25 days before the expected harvest, so that there are no harmful substances in the ripe fruits.
2. Immediately after harvest.
3. In autumn, when the plants shed their leaves.

Scab pathogens develop resistance to fungicides, so for each treatment it is better to choose drugs with different active ingredients. For example, spray the plants with Horus the first time, Topaz the second, and Skorom the third. By the way, you can use only chemical agents, only biological ones, or alternate them.

We wrote in detail about how to properly process processing. this article.

mustard solution

This natural remedy is safe for the crop, so it can be used at any stage of ripening.

Dissolve 4 tablespoons of dry mustard in 1 liter of warm water. Then dilute the mixture with 9 liters of water. Thoroughly spray the leaves, stems and ovaries on the plants with the resulting solution.

Repeat the treatment after about four weeks.

How to deal with scab on potatoes and beets

After harvest collect all the tops (and potato bushes also have the remains of roots), throw them off the site or burn them. In the beds where diseased plants grew, do not plant potatoes and beets for 4-5 years to prevent re-infection in future seasons. At the same time, scab pathogens of these vegetables are not dangerous for other crops, so the site can be safely used.

Immediately before planting potatoes, it is worth disinfecting the tubers. For this, special preparations are suitable (for example, Maxim-KS, Fitosporin or Quadris), which are diluted according to the instructions on the package. You can make the mixture yourself by dissolving 0.5 g of boric acid, 0.6 g of potassium permanganate and 0.8 g of copper sulfate in 1 liter of water. You need to dip the tubers in a disinfectant liquid, spread them in one layer on a flat surface in the shade, leave for 2-3 hours, and then proceed to landing.

Before planting, beet seeds can be dipped for 20 minutes in a 1% solution of boric acid, a 3% solution of hydrogen peroxide, or in a 1% solution of potassium permanganate. After that, drain the liquid and dry them to a free-flowing state.