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Title: TISSUE CULTURED PEACH NOT AS TOLERANT AS LOVELL ROOTSTOCK TO SHORT-LIFE UNDER FIELD CONDITIONS

Author
item GEIGHARD, GREGORY - CLEMSON UNIVERSITY
item ZEHR, ELDON - CLEMSON UNIVERSITY
item Hammerschlag, Freddi

Submitted to: HortScience
Publication Type: Abstract Only
Publication Acceptance Date: 7/1/1997
Publication Date: N/A
Citation: N/A

Interpretive Summary:

Technical Abstract: Peach tree short life (PTSL) is a serious peach tree disease syndrome on replant orchard sites in the Southeast. Pseudomonas syringae pv. syringae is a bacterial disease often associated with tree injury and death on these PTSL sites. Rootstocks that have better tolerance to ring nematodes such as Lovell have less PTSL death. Tissue cultured peach embryos and/or explants have shown increased resistance to Pseudomonas syringae and Xanthomonas campestris pv. pruni, another bacterial peach pathogen, in laboratory and greenhouse screenings. Tissue cultured Redhaven (RH), Redskin (RS) and Sunhigh (SH) cultivars on their own roots were planted with SH seedlings and RH and RS budded to Lovell rootstock on a severe PTSL site in South Carolina. Treatments beside cultivar/rootstock combination included preplant fumigation versus non-fumigation. PTSL appeared in the third year and by year four significant tree death occurred. Tissue culture RH, RS, and SH trees had 54, 55, and 88% PTSL death, respectively compared to RH (17%) and RS (29%) on Lovell or the SH seedlings (25%). Fumigation significantly decreased PTSL in both RS combinations but not RH. These data suggest that the tolerance of the cultivar root system to PTSL inducing factors such as ring nematodes was more important in PTSL than scion resistance to bacteria.