Is it a fungal problem? Learn to identify common fungal diseases in plants and discover effective organic and conventional treatment methods.
Grow cordyceps at home in 60 to 75 days. Grow Cordyceps militaris on brown rice in sealed pint jars, not the famous caterpillar fungus, which needs a living ghost moth caterpillar and Himalayan altitude. Nobody fruits that on a kitchen…
Pestalotiopsis leaf spot follows damage and wet foliage. The 8 strategies below keep the fungus off conifers and palms through sanitation, dry leaves, and stress repair, starting with the dead tissue that feeds it. The signature on conifers is a…
Thread blight on figs has no cure and no fungicide fix. The 5 strategies below keep the disease in check through sanitation, pruning, and dry foliage, starting with the leaf cleanup that removes the fungus from the tree. The signature…
Quince rust has no cure once orange spore horns cover the fruit. The 10 strategies below break the two-host cycle that keeps the fungus alive, starting with the triage call that tells you whether spraying is worth it at all.…
Gummy stem blight kills cucurbit vines from the stem outward, and the 10 strategies below stop it before the gum ever appears. The disease shows as water-soaked lesions that crack open and ooze red to amber gum, and the same…
Pink snow mold kills turf outright where gray snow mold only browns leaves. A pink patch at snowmelt can leave bare ground that needs reseeding, while a gray patch usually greens up from the crown on its own. The 10…
Sooty blotch and flyspeck leave black smudges and black dots on apples, and the fruit stays safe to eat. Both marks sit on the fruit surface and never rot the flesh. The 10 strategies below sort the two forms, then…
Volutella blight is two fungal diseases sharing one common name, and both attack plants that sit in millions of yards. The 10 strategies below save the planting around the infection, starting with the triage call that tells you whether treatment…
Kabatina tip blight and Phomopsis tip blight both kill juniper shoot tips, and the 8 strategies below stop the pair at the pruning cut. The two fungi look alike on dead tips. The canker location and the season separate them.…
The small dark spots scattered across your grass are almost certainly helminthosporium leaf spot, a fungal lawn disease that looks worse than it usually is. For most home lawns the spotted-blade phase is cosmetic and fades with a few weeks…
Take-all root rot kills lawns from the roots up. The fungus infects turf in the cool months of fall and spring, then the damage shows in late spring and summer when heat and drought stress the weakened roots. The 10…
Tar spot on maple looks alarming and does almost no harm. The black spots are a fungal leaf disease, and the tree keeps growing through it. The 8 strategies below start with the one action that actually cuts next year…
Spot anthracnose on dogwood looks like a disaster in May. Hundreds of tiny purple-rimmed spots freckle every bract and leaf, and the white bracts turn tan and ragged. The 9 strategies below start with the one move that saves the…
Fusicoccum canker has no cure once it enters a blueberry cane. The 9 strategies below save the bush around the infection, starting with the triage call that tells you whether cutting is worth it at all. The signature is a…
Sphaeropsis dieback is Diplodia tip blight. The two names describe one disease, one fungus, and one set of symptoms on pines with 2 and 3 needles per bundle. The fungus now carries the name Diplodia pinea. Older books and labels…
Zonate leaf spot on sorghum rarely costs a grain grower yield. 4 field decisions carry the whole response: rotation, residue, hybrid choice, and one honest spray call. Alabama Extension reports that the disease rarely has a significant effect on grain…
Leptosphaerulina leaf spot of alfalfa starts as pepper spots on new leaves and ends with leaf drop before harvest. The spots grow into eyespots, oval and brown with dark margins and yellow halos, and they merge along the leaf veins…
Pestalotia leaf spot is a strawberry disease that starts as leaf spots and can end with rotted fruit, dead crowns, and whole fields pulled out of production. It hit Florida strawberry fields hard across two seasons, 2018-19 and 2019-20, and…
Anthracnose leaf spot on shade trees looks worse than it usually is. Brown blotches spread along the veins, leaves curl and drop, and a healthy-looking tree can look half dead by late spring. Most shade trees releaf by early to…
Walk the lawn in the morning and look at the leaf tips before you look at the patches. Curvularia blight fades a lawn from the leaf tip down, and it attacks stressed grass first. The fix runs through 5 steps,…
