Would building a bonfire upwind of my Methley tree help? I’ve got plenty of firewood. I’ve actually thought of that. 
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I would build a bonfire out of your methley tree. It surely is the greatest vector for infecting your other trees with blackknot. Mine was prone to all manner of diseases, so I dug it up roots and all and torched it. I’ve only seen one small infection on my other plum trees since I took it out a couple of years ago. Good ridence I say.
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Last year my AU Rosa bloomed mid Feb… it is self fruitful and set 100 tiny plums…
Mid March we had two nights back to back… 25F then 26F… and all those tiny plums shriveled and fell off.
My earliest blueberry blossoms got toasted too.
Strange thing is how when I read about susceptibility of BK in the general lit, I have never seen Methely called out for being a BK Mary. That is, I’ve never seen it identified as more susceptible than maybe any other common plum. It is so obvious I wonder how to the university gurus miss it. Too much time in the classroom or lab?
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@TNHunter just curious, what do you use for embossing your tags? It looks too neat to be just metal stamps I’ve seen on Amazon.
@tubig … I bought a vintage (model M22) Dymo-Mite tape writer off ebay for 60.00.
It is in great shape and works well.
It came with a plastic tape roll… but it works with aluminum and stainless steel tape rolls as well.
I bought 2 (1/2 inch x 16 ft) aluminum tape rolls from LableValue.com.
I have about 75% of my stuff labled & tagged now. Trees, bushes, vines… and gtafts added.
PS you can get a new model Dymo Mite tapewriter that has a few more bells and whistles… for around 250.00.
This 60.00 vintage tapewriter i am happy with.
I have to manually cut off the aluminum tape tag once finished making it (scissors work for that).
And i use a small nail setting tool to punch the hole.
I think the newer models can do that for you.
Hope this helps.
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PS… as the sun is setting… those aluminum tags really reflect the sunlight in a very pretty way…
Almost like they are glowing, twinkling…
BLING for your fruit trees 
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The Methley is the only plum tree that I have so it can’t infect the “other trees”. Don’t have any plans to plant anymore plum trees.
If I die of a heart attack while pruning out the Black Knot so be it.
Well I guess that’s a good thing, but other trees in the stone fruit family can still get black knot I believe. Just FYI it wasn’t just black knot that was a problem for Methley. It also had issues with canker, plum pocket, and/or brown rot. Basically the fruit was inedible because of diease(s) affecting the fruit, and I live in an area where these types of issues are not common. None of my other fruit trees exhibited the problems that Methley had other than black knot which has diminished greatly since the Methley was removed. I’m just saying, I’ve never had any other tree that exhibited all the types of problems Methley had. In the end it was no loss taking it out because the fruit was not worth eating with all the issues it had.
Wondering if the so-called “double nickel” biofungicides would work . Revitalize lists many diseases it controls. Or is black knot bacterial. Gotta look this up since my Methley is budded.
Mid-Missouri zone 6b. As of today(Mar 8) both the Santa Rosa and Methley plums are in full bloom. Temps are to drop to 31 degreesF tonight and 27 tomarrow night. Also in full bloom is my Sweet Heart Apricot and Nankin Cherry.
These trees are blooming 21 days (3 weeks) earlier than they did both last year and the year before.
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Flowering can (obviously) depend on the set the previous year flower buds, which in turn depends on the adequate water supply (among others) at the time of setting - from late June till some time in Aug for most species, but that can vary in/be specific for/ your climate.
All my plums are in full bloom as well as my one Contender peach. As mentioned before late blooming or better frost/cold resistance is what us in this area needs. AU Rosa and Spring Satin are two that I like the taste of but they usually get killed off. My early blooming pears have similar problems but seem to survive better most years.
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My AU Rosa is about done blooming now… and my graft of AU Producer and Shiro are still blooming strong.
My EU Plum Mt. Royal … no sign of blossoms yet. Last year was its first year to bloom and only a few blossoms opened. Hopefully more this year.
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@TNHunter I picked up a variety of plum trees from Kroger of all places - have been following this thread and was going to pick the best varieties that you and @SoMtHomestead came up with next year, but I couldn’t pass the opportunity up. Alderman and Morris just wrapped up blooming last weekend. Spring Satin plumcot looked like it was a little ahead of those two. I figure we are about 2 weeks behind you up here - apple trees are just starting to leaf out.
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Here this year AU Rosa bloomed first… March 1.
4 or 5 days later my graft of AU Producer and my Shiro tree started blooming.
AU Rosa will absolutely fruit by itself… very succesful at that… and AU Producer and Shiro bloom at the same time… ideal.
This spring i added grafts (all looking succesful at this point)… of Alderman, Superior, Beauty, Spring Satin PC, South Mtn EB PC and Vic Red American plum.
Hopefully with all those in place everyone gets some pollin.
My Mt Royal EU plum is in full bloom now… first year for it to have significant bloom (started in 2018).
Took a long time to start producing… but it blooms a good 3 weeks after AU Producer. That should help with late frosts, some years anyway.
Good Luck to you !
.
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My Japanese plums bloomed March 8. Our Stanley Prune plum was in full bloom yesterday (Mar 31) as are all the native plum trees in the woods.
Our Winesap apple and Wolf River apple started blooming today. And it is raining!!
Thanks, we will have to compare notes next year. I’m excited to see how everything does. There hasn’t been a lot of talk about Morris other than an old thread where @thecityman said he really liked it and it did well for him… and he is about halfway between us. So I am optimistic.
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I wouldnt trust kroger trees to be true to label. It will be interesting to see what you get, but the odds are that it wouldnt be repeatable. I have had terrible luck with big box store varietes. The best I can tell, they are 10-20% accurate. They should make decent root stocks for grafting unless they are actually Methley or some other black knot magnet.
Honestly, those were my thoughts. Even if they just end up getting topworked to something else, they were a steal. The Morris has set a couple of fruit so if they hold on, I may be able to determine something about that one this year.