Is this bacterial spot on my peach tree?

One more thing. I also have apple, pear, nectarine, plum and apricot trees. From what I remember, only the peach and nectarines had this problem. Should and could I spray all the trees. Is it a good preventative measure? Also, are there any trees that I should NOT spray copper on? Thanks again for all your help!

Lotsofkids, I use the oil spray on all my stone fruit with good results. I avoid spraying when the buds open. I try to get it just before the blooms burst open. Here in So. Cal. we worry mostly about peach leaf curl. You seem to be comfortable with chemical insecticides, so you might want to investigate using a systemic on your apples and pears. I oil spray spray mine at the same time I spray the stone fruit. You cannnot use it on stone fruit but Bayer claims it is safe and effective for apples and pears. (and a whole lot of other things). Don

Cherries don't like copper, although I think you can apply it while they are dormant.

Apricots don't like sulphur.

You can spray copper on any dormant fruit tree. I have also sprayed copper on my cherries in the growing season to no ill effect but I have heard it can lead to problems. Copper is primarily a dormant spray, not a growing season spray.

Some growing season disease sprays for backyard growers include Immunox (myclobutanil), Fungonil (chloronathil), mancozeb, and Monterey Garden Fungi-Fighter (propiconazole). I don't know if those will help with your disease above or not since I am not sure what it is.

Don, I assume that Bayer stuff you are referring to is imidacloprid aka Merit. It is for bugs, not diseases, and that is a completely different class of compounds. That stuff is illegal to spray on commercial fruit trees and someone recently called Bayer up and they told them not to eat any fruit on a tree treated with it. So, I would stay away from that stuff. If you find out otherwise I would be interested to hear it.


Scott

scottsfsmith, Yep, that's the stuff, imidacloprid. The label says safe for apples and pears, DO NOT use on a long, inclusive, list of stone fruit. I recently talked with several bayer people. They kept transfering me from one person to another. I was looking for something that might be effective on aloe mites. No luck, but they did confirm that their systemic was OK for apples and pears. I actually don't use it as the oil spray program I follow seems to work well. I have not even added copper or sulfur to the oil the last two seasons. I use canola oil during the growing season, as it is very light but seems to be effective. I even use it on my citrus. More importantly, I think healthy trees are the first line of defense. Don

Don, now that I think of it, it may have been a peach tree they advised not to eat the fruit on. Peaches could take it up in a way that apples pears don't. One thing I find odd about this stuff is it is approved for backyard growers but not for commercial; usually its the opposite case. I agree that healthy trees is the most important thing. I have one area where my peach trees were too closely planted and were also not getting enough light due to a big pine in the way. Half of those trees got bacterial canker.

Scott



This message was edited Mar 11, 2009 9:23 AM