How can gardeners prevent late blight from surviving the winter?
Gardeners can take steps now and into the fall to prevent late blight from surviving the winter. As far as most plant pathologist determine at this time, there is only one mating type of Phytophora infestans in the Northeast. Dr. Kim Stoner of the Connecticut Agricultural Experiment Station writes “this is important because it means the pathogen cannot produce oospores able to survive away from living tissue. Because tomatoes don’t have any living tissue that survives the winter, all that needs to be done to infected tomato plants is cut them down and till them under.” Even seeds from the fruit that was infected will not carry the pathogen, so you can still use your own seeds to start next year’s crop. Most gardeners have harvested potatoes by now. I harvested mine in late August when I noticed that the vines were beginning to exhibit late blight damage. I disposed of any diseased looking tubers and vines. Potatoes are more difficult to deal with than tomatoes because infected tubers c
Related Questions
- Could the late blight pathogen survive between seasons on perennial weeds that it is able to infect (e.g. bittersweet nightshade and hairy nightshade)?
- Does intergenic recombination play an important role in evolution of alleles at the RB late blight resistance locus?
- Can plants be saved in a farm planting once late blight starts to develop?
