Question?

I wonder if you could give me some insight in your vast experience with apple trees? I have a farm in West Clare, and my apple trees suffered badly from scab last summer, as the weather was rather wet. Now I heard about winter wash that could be applied to prevent this from happening again. I am in the process of converting the farm to organic, so I don’t want to use anything that isn’t approved organic.

Is there anything you could recommend? What are you using to prevent scab, or are you not using anything at all?

Answer:

unfortunately in our damp summer its hard to be scab free. A tolerable level is the best target. Our orchards suffered quite badly too. The varieties that are more scab resistant stand out in this environment…

Because of conflicting duties and tight time we have done very little to control scab in the last few years. We should have and i hope we get back to the problem this coming year. So i’m hoping to improve my knowledge personally and a winter wash would be on my list of things to learn about but i’m afraid i have no suggestions or experience of them as of yet.

The first step i believe is hygiene – every year the leaves and fruit fall – the scab lives in these. So each year you have a chance to start afresh – rake up all fallen leaves and gather all windfall and rotten fruit – they are the means of harbouring and over wintering for the spores. Compost the leaves and fruit. This should help to control the problem and reduce the ‘disease pressure’.

Hawthorn, as a relative of the apple, also harbours scab. If you have a lot of hawthorn nearby then this is a means of harbouring the disease over the winter. Many fruit growers eliminate hawthorn from their hedges. This is a severe measure maybe and one that we haven’t done. But we are practising as good a hygiene procedure as we can.

Hope this helps, apologies that i cannot give you the complete solution…

I would appreciate it if you share with me any knowledge you might find elsewhere or any success you might have with your efforts,

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