Fireblight

This is the first year my combo pear has produced euro pears. I have Bartlett, Flemish Beauty and Seckel. And. . . fireblight. How does the darn tree know that it is fruiting and then throws the worst disease at it that it possibly can. I have already picked off two black pears. This is truly sickening as I love pears and have waited so patiently for this tree to finally produce. Is there anything I can do or spray at this time??? Many thanks.

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Sorry about the fireblight. You might already know this but in my area most pear trees grow well here but when they bloom the pollinators carry the fireblight from one flower to another. If the type pear has little natural resistance like Bartlett it gets fireblight. Some reports say Seckel is resistant and some says it is not. I think most suggestions would be to cut well below the infected area and disinfect your cutting tool between cuts, Bill

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I took out my Seckel because it keep getting Fireblight every year. I don’t think it’s very resistant.

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Bummer @mrsg47. I hope you get some pears. Everything is running early here. Really a strange year.

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Continuing the discussion from 2016 graft thread:

Fireblight killed my Seckel last year but the D’Anjou 8’ away had only minor damage.

Last spring the Seckel bloomed profusely and I had a bumper crop of fruit hanging so I kept trying to cut out the infected areas but it continued to spread extending all the way past the graft union. It was really sickening.

The rootstock shot up some new growth this spring which I recently grafted with three different varieties.

One of them is Warren which is supposedly nearly immune to fireblight.
I guess we will see.

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Mrs. G.,
Are you sure it is fire blight? Can you post pics? You mentioned blackened fruit. What about the leaves?

Mam, the leaves look singed with black. It is definitely fireblight. No flowers, no fireblight; flowers, no tree.

I’m seeing something in some pear trees here that I first thought was fireblight but may be something else. I noticed that not all the black started on the tips and worked down and also that the trees looked much better a couple weeks after first symptoms appeared. I will be trying to figure this out now that the demands of my 3-spray are over. I didn’t even look for psyla, but saw some blister mite damage that could be related. I will begin diagnostics next week.

All I read is that at this time of the year, way after blooms, not much is suggested but to remove infected limb of the tree and disinfected your pruner between cuts.

Has it spread to more areas of your trees?

I had some fireblight on Sugar Sweet this year . I may consider top working it over to something else next year .

The other pears look good. Its just the bartlett. The leaves have black edges and look really crispy! A bit has spread to the seckel, but not much. Will take pics.

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black edged leaves are not always fire blight, though. Please post pics for experts could help you identify the problem.

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What condition is the wood near the burnt leaves? If the actual limb looks ok then it might be something else other than FB that only blackens the leaf. In some cases when I only have a few damaged leaves (assuming it is not FB) I pick them off.