Bacteria - The new sherrif in town
Fortunately when it comes to bacterial spread in a tree diagnosing it and treating it is a very possible task. The only problem is that some of the time bacteria spread can look like a tree is changing for the winter season. This is why it is a good idea to know if a certain tree is susceptable to any bacterias that are fatal. In the case of the most common trees to have bacterial issues the symptoms are very noticable and not common in the least bit.
The picture to the right shows an apple tree with a bacterial disease called fire blight. This disease shows to be very sporadic in nature and is turning the leaves brown. Then the leaves hang on the tree very similar to insect damage. This is strange because a bacteria is much closer to a fungus in terms of spreading nature and biology. So why does it look like this?
Well the answer is that the spread of this disease and other bacterial diseases in trees is done through vector insects. Ones that do not harm the tree but instead carry deadly diseases from tree to tree. We see this in citrus trees right now as citrus greening diseases is being spread rapidly and is killing off citrus crops in many southern states.
Aphids, pictured to the left, leaf hoppers and feeding insects are often the carriers of these diseases. In the case of citrus greening it is an insect in the psyllid family. These insects rarely go noticed as they hide out on the backsides of leaves and do little to no noticable damage to the trees or plants. Sometimes in mass they can be noticed as the waste porduct of their feeding is a sticky substance called honeydew. This often falls onto patios, furniture, vehicles and other landscape items causing a headache for homeowners to clean up their mess.
Well that deffinitly means we have to kill these pests whenever they cross onto our landscape right? In most cases leaving them alone is just fine. In some cases though the damage they do can be far worse then it seems. When it comes to pest and disease control in your trees its always good to have the experts at Arbor Doctor on your side.
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