Purple reign

I am probably the wrong person to ask, since I have planted just about every type of fruit tree that will possibly grow in my location, but if they have problems I take them out. So far this year I have removed a Methley plum and am about to cut down two large apple trees that are in decline. I have taken out a couple mulberry plants that were disease prone, but most seem to take Florida’s humid climate fairly well. Fungal leaf spot usually makes its appearance every year on most of my mulberries and also figs. But fungal problems usually don’t become pervasive until later in the year, and rarely have a devistating effect on the health of the plant. I really don’t know enough about bacterial blight (if that is even what you have) to tell you if your other trees are at risk…But I have read that some cultivars are much more susceptible than others, and that Morus nigra is suscepible. One article stated that they didn’t know why bacterial blight was not a problem in Great Britain as it was in the United States (if that is even what you have).

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Sorry didn’t mean to kidnap this thread…

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Sorry guys…didn’t mean to kidnap this thread…

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Probably black knot. Sooty- blotch affects apples.

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Different conversation but still within Morus nigra kingdom. Encouraged by the success of my recent experiment of pruning for the purpose of waking up stubbornly semi-dormant seedlings, I went ahead and did a few more, photos below. I’m starting to think that this human intervention may be a necessity in coaxing young nigra seedlings into adulthood, a rite of passage of sorts…That would explain why nigras reproduce so poorly in the wild. No surprise if we accept that nigras have been around for a long time and have been subjected to an advanced degree of domestication. The same thing happens with animal breeds that are overly domesticated. They

will not reproduce without human assistance. That would also explain why my first batch of twenty seedlings years ago did not survive past 3 or 4 years. At the time, I did not prune, and watched them go one after the other. Food for thought…

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Beautiful! Doesn’t look like any of your plants are seeing any disease problems…Hopefully that will continue. Have you ever purchased a Morus nigra for your location?

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I did purchase a grafted M. nigra. That’s the one that hasn’t woken up so far. I gave it a light pruning hoping that it would do the trick, but nothing so far, despite a green scratch test…

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Going back to k8tpayaso’s problem, could it be snail/slug damage? I’ve seen that happen with too much rain. I personally would wait and see. I’ve also pledged to myself not to ever use chemicals in my yard. So it’ll be nature’s way or nothing. If I see snails, I relocate them to my neighbors’ yards, mostly airborne…

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Snails do love mulberry leaves! In a night one snail can eat a dozen holes or more in several mulberry leaves. But the borders of the holes only turn a little brown with time…never black.like k8tpayaso’s problem.

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RARELY do we see a snail or slug here.

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Those are very unusual leafs for a nigra.

I have a couple of grafted nigras and they woke up in the spring with zero intervention. I’m in Zone 9B.

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This doesn’t happen to all seedlings, only 4 in 10 in my area for this batch. The others did wake up on their own.

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Texas nigra update:

Still spraying with Serenade. Does not look any worse. I have determined that the disease process that is so aggressive is limited to new growth on non-lignified stems. Leaves on the woody stems are showing some fungal spot but not severely affected. It continues to rain here almost daily. We are about to set a record for July precipitation.

Lower leaves on woody stems

New growth and leaves just below on non woody stems



No leaves are dropping…yet…

Katy

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I’m glad it’s not worse. It almost looks like a sunburn…

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Here is a little update about my attempts of growing Morus Nigra in my zone 7a.

Failures first:
It seems I managed to kill a graftet Nigra “Jerusalem” I got as a gift. The tree was growing in a container and out of a sudden all its leaves became yellow and pale, plus it stopped growing while my other nigras are still actively growing. I did suspect some root issue since the container was too small for the size of the tree and I already had its repotting on schedule for the winter. I saw the tree was in trouble and decided to repot immediately, probably a mistake. The tree shed all its leaves and after some weeks without progress I did some scratch testing at the rootstock (alba). The cambium of the rootstock was already brown and dead. I did some emergency grafting to some alba seedlings I had around but I probably was too late. The buds did show some green still but appeared quite dry already. I don’t know if the yellowing of the leaves was caused by a dying rootstock or a late grafting incompatibility. The tree did not grow much this year, plus it did show the same symptoms in late summer last year. I suspected issues with my fertilizing but wasn’t able to work it out. Tried different things without success (calzium, magnesium, iron, nitrogen)…

Successes:
Some time ago I did a report about my ugly grafts of scions I gathered from two big old trees. Those grafts are doing exceptionally well. I am quite surprised to see aprox 2 feet of new growth from the upper graft. It is still growing.
The lower graft did put on only 6-8 inches but thats because of apical dominance/shade from the upper graft.
The tree is in ground.

We are having a very wet summer. Still there are no signs of fungal or other problems yet.

I do have another purchased Morus Nigra “Sham Dudu”. It is grafted high on an alba rootstock. The grafting point is not very well attached to the stock. I am going to bud it lower onto the same stock. It is in a container and doesn’t seem to have the same trouble as my (ex) “Jerusalem”. It is growing very well too, aprox 1’4’’. Again I didn’t suspect it to grow as much, cause everywhere I read they are very slow growers and the tree is growing in a container.

Experiments:
Right now I try to root some green cuttings of Morus alba/rubra “Wellington” and a Morus Nigra. I would really like to have them on their own roots.
I built a fog chamber and am using bottom heat. It seems to work with “Wellington” but doesn’t with the Nigra. It is still too early to throw in the towel but the green cutting of Nigra didn’t develop callus yet while the cuttings of “Wellington” did. Both show no roots but I bet the cuttings of Wellington will root in the end. The leaves still look healthy, while the leaves of the Nigra cutting are looking weaker every day. The experiment is going for 6 weeks now. I already potted up some rooted fig, plum and apricot cuttings I did start at the same time as kind of my control group.

If they don’t root I will try more mature cuttings. But I don’t have enough material to do larger testings yet.

PS:
To build the fog chamber I used a fish tank and combined it with a fogger regularly used for reptile houses. That idea I did lend from @Alcedo. I would really like to thank him for bringing this up. But sadly thats not possible since he passed away.

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It’s good to hear other’s attempts of growing Morus nigra out of its comfort zone. I’ve had good growth (>12") so far out of my Morus nigra, but I’ve had to spray it with fungicide…Here in Northern Florida it has rained nearly every day for over two months. Next year I am going to try one of the newer organic fungal treatments and see how well it does. I know it can’t survive another summer like this one without treatment, since early in June, after the rain had just started, it was totally covered in fungal leaf spot. But all the new growth has been kept completely free of leaf spot disease (but I’ve had to spray nearly every day).
k8tpayaso (in Texas; see previous pics) has had bad luck with her Morus nigra (and perhaps could of had better advice from someone other than I). I attempted to diagnose her nigra problem from some leaf samples she sent me…It appears to have two problems…one bacterial and one fungal. I feel I identified the fungus properly in the genus of Fusarium, but I’m unsure of the species. And I can’t pin down the bacterial pathogen. I made a Youtube video about it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RFjX5vr9YMQ&t=45s

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awesome report @carot . Incidentally, you just made me look at @Alcedo 's profile, and literally had me contemplate his latest post, which was Nov 11 2016. Thanks for sharing[quote=“Livinginawe, post:196, topic:5707”]
made a Youtube video about it:
[/quote]

love the super-animated footage of microflora and microfauna, could see wrigglers darting about!

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NO WAY!! I don’t think so…in my opinion the spray did halt or greatly slow the disease. It just was overwhelming when it hit. Three things might have made a difference.

  1. If I had recognized the problem sooner–what I thought was trauma from wind was actually disease.
  2. If I had the spray available and not had to order it online–that took another 2-3 days to get the spray.
  3. If I had not put out fertilizer–the new growth was attacked with a vengeance. It might have not made a difference but in my mind it did.

I greatly appreciate all you did…and you are still answering my questions!! :blush:

AND IT WAS SUCH A BEAUTIFUL TREE!!! :cry::cry::cry::cry:

Katy

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Thank you, Katy, for the warm gesture…I try my best, but “I’m just a guy”…

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Here are some pictures of the mentioned grafts.
This are my ugly grafts with scions of 2 old trees onto the same rootstock. Had only one available last year. My measuring tape says this years growth is 1’8". I had some problems with slugs and snails. They destroyed all growing tips of the lower graft and attacked young leaves too.

This is my morus nigra “sham dudu” in a Container. New growth is exactly 1’.

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