Hi,
I just wanted to let all of your know about a great success I had in my orchard.
I live in SoCal and as you may have heard, we had a WET winter and a FOGGY spring and summer. (Stil foggy this week!!)
Anyway along with climate change and drought, for the first time in the 25 years since I have owned this property, I had a terrible outbreak of fire blight. It killed one of my apples and severely attacked the others and started going after the pears and quince as well. For two years, I pruned and pruned and could not stop its advance. This year, I used the biological, Agriphage. I used it exactly as the manufacturer recommended, on the blooms, whenever we had a break in the rain. I am so very pleased at how healthy all of my pom fruits are this year!! Even one of my apples that has fireblight in the trunk is doing beautifully!!
That’s really interesting. I remember reading about the product quite awhile ago but at the time it was not available at retail, only the product for tomato blight.
Given how effective phages can be against bacteria I wonder if a single application would be enough to provide multiple years of benefit…
I do not know, but, considering how healthy my trees are this year and that I still have some left, I will be using it again next year.
I could not buy it in CA retail. However, I got it mail order from Seven Springs Farm supply in VA. They were also really helpful when I asked questions about quantity to order, efficacy, etc. I will be trying the coddle moth biological from them next year as well.
As an added note, I tried Howler on my stone fruits to help against brown rot and peach leaf curl. The peach leaf curl was so bad on my nectaplum, that it totally defoliated, barely grew and did not bloom. I was very sad that it I
Did not help since it was only a three year old tree. It is alive and well, but I lost an entire year of growth. We had HEAVY FOG this year like I have not seen on the property in the 25 years I shave owned it.