Fireblight is a bacterium that infects members of the Rosacea family—roses, apples, pears, quince and peaches and cherries.

Pears and quince the most susceptible but apples can get it.

Untreated fireblight can kill trees. But it can be treated.

So if planning to plant apples and/or pear  or quince trees talk to your nursery, not a resaler of trees but the nursery that grafts scions to rootstocks to chose the rootstock used and the trees to plant choosing fireblight resistant trees and rootstocks.


Treatment

1. Pruning. Before starting to prune make sure secateurs are sharp. Prepare a 10% bleach solution: 90% water + 10% bleach. BEFORE each cut dip the secateur blades into that solution else you could spread the disease to clean branches. Cut 30cm below the lowest infected leaf/twig. Burn the prunings.

2. Spray. A copper spray will kill the bacteria. For follow up sprays use the following. It will control a lot of pests and boost the health and immunity to disease of the trees:

For 5L of spray make up:

Unpasteurised Neem oil (this must be 25*C or warmer so no lumps present)
Pure liquid soap (to emulsify the neem oil)
Essential bacteria (to kill blight bacteria, boost trees’ immune systems
Molasses to feed the essential bacteria
Fish hydrosylate (or Charlie Carp but hydrosylate is better, rawer)
dried kelp. (or Seasol Maxicrop)


Spray the top and bottoms of leaves. Use the spray when the buds are going slightly light colored, again when they are just about to open and when they are open and every 4 weeks. (Days in my case now!)

In winter, sterilising the secateurs before each cut cut 100-150ml below any bacterial cankers, burning the prunings as before.

Plenty of info about, e.g:
https://ohioline.osu.edu/factsheet/plpath-fru-22-0

https://www.rwhendricksenco.com/tree-blight-identification-symptoms-control/

The trees I had to prune the most, pears and quince, I fed with a handful of blood and bone, worked that into the top of the soil a bit, added compost then watered in with water plus Seasol. All have some new green, clean leaves.

Will spray all the trees again with the spray listed above. Had sprayed with copper on Monday.

All the trees that had blight are full of healthy new leaves.

I added a small amount of charlie carp to the watering can along with more seasol. It is high nitrogen but only added a small amount.

Will be buying rock dust, that will add some phosphates slowly.

Ended up with FOUR Golden Harvey trees instead of the three I wanted. Not that I care!

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Eat, juice, cider. Since I am 5500Km weatherwise from Antarctica  the summers will be hot enough to have fantastic fruit to eat, to juice and to make cider! So, I bought one tree too many? Great!

If the apples are a bit small—great size for a lunch box!

Two and a bit (10 trees) of bitter sweet apples went in the ground today:

Brown Snout—quality cider apple with a “desert wine” character.

Dabinet—the top vintage cider variety

Yarlington Mill (a seedling found growing between two stones in the millrace at Yarlington, UK) another very high quality vintage cider apple.

Hubbardston Nonsuch—planted with the bittersweets because it blossoms very late in spring.

Probably Wednesday we will start planting some eating and cooking apples—already have Sturmer Pippin, Cox Orange Pippin and Granny Smith planted.

Cox Orange Pippin is the champion eating apple! Crisp, tasty, aromatic and juicy. You know you are eating something when you eat a COP! A fiddly tree to grow, I bought a Lord Lambourne—pretty damn similar to a COP but a damn sight easier to grow—insurance.

ALL my apple trees are in the ground bar one stripling I will repot into a larger pot and stow out of the winter cold, maybe to plant in spring this year?

All the trees planted look good and healthy.

That blight or fungus still around but only the odd leaf here or there. Will spray with copper later today.

A couple pears still to be planted and the cherry trees—will order gravel, sand and loam—they need really good drainage, well the Stella cherry tree does.

The pears—some trees are missing like my Green Horse perry pears (3) and my Buerre Hardy and Doyenne du Comice—no sign of them anywhere, damnit!

Feeling tired but good!

Some pear trees are missing:

Green Horse perry pear, two off

Doyenne du Comice, one off

Beurre Hardy, one off


There is a tree I think is a beurre Bosc tree, else one of those is missing.


I say missing—not delivered by my landscape guy—or pinched from here.

Great, will order replacements, any I cannot get as advanced trees will have to wait 3 years to get fruit, fukkit! This is a bit of a blow, was looking forward to eating really delicious fruit next year!

However, I have four sweet cherry trees to plant.

Will rotary hoe a strip at the front of the vege patch and plant the 3 black currants, 2 red currants, one white currant and one Cape gooseberry. Heh, I have been eating some of the rather small fruits on the bushes (vines?) and they are nice. There is a distinct “currant family” flavor to the fruits.

I will leave them as they are after planting, cut the canes right down once they go dormant. Gonna be great!