I have a Lee Cherry (with other varieties grafted onto it) growing in the Rio Grande Valley, Texas- Zone 10a. I planted Lee, Stella, Minnie, and Royal Crimson last spring and all 4 grew until 3 died, leaving Lee as the sole survivor. They died from what I suspect was root rot, but now Lee is getting these weird sunken/soft spots that are dark and dying/dead. I peeled back in two places to compare the dead and living tissues underneath. I also noticed the color is starting at many lenticels on the main trunk. We have been in a drought with no rain so I know this isn’t root rot. Any idea if this is a disease or heat damage? I “painted” the trunk with a Garden Phos / PentraBark solution to prevent any diseases, but then this showed up. The tree is pushing new leaves everywhere, but I remember last year’s trees growing normally then suddenly wilting and dying (typical root rot symptoms right?). This is growing on a Mahaleb rootsock which seems perfectly healthy. The other cherries had Mazzard or Maxima and died so I figured root rot. My Lee is around 10’ tall and I’d hate to lose it. Is there anything I can do?
My last ditch effort, if Lee dies, is to grow an Adara and bud cherry varieties onto the main trunk or on large branches.
Thanks in advance,
Danny
The most common cause of necrosis on the bark on cherries is bacterial canker. So that would be my first guess. But I usually see some sap oozing out when there is canker. Your climate is very different than mine so the different look could be climate related. Or you have some disease there which I have never seen.
2 Likes
Thank you for your input! Last year I covered the trunk with IV Organics 3in1 paint, but didn’t do so this year. We also had that nasty heat dome in June with temps at 106-108 every day with higher heat indexes. We are also in a drought, so I’m not sure what is causing this. The tree had minor gummosis earlier in the year but it dried up and hasn’t returned.
Danny
no idea, really. The sunken lenticles are interesting though. Youd think theyd be likely entry points for a pathogen, though Ive yet to have heard of or seen such a symptom. Maybe its heat related? Sustained temps of 106 seems like it would stress most temperate crops, but then you did have issues last year. Im out of my wheelhouse on this one, but thought Id throw in my 2 cents. @fruitnut ?
2 Likes
Hi Danny,
This has been an unusual year for me as well. One of my Bing cherries that I had top worked with Adara and cherry plum to support growing plum varieties, developed a wilting syndrome causing defoliation of one branch and spreading to several other plum trees around it. I treated the affected trees with liquid copper which may have been effective for this season but several trees did suffer losing some scaffolds. I was unable to obtain a diagnosis that fit the symptoms. I will be treating all my plums with several applications of fungicide during the dormant season.
Sorry to see your cherry tree news. Since you do have Adara, it’s worth trying several approaches to get a rootstock that can do better than you have experienced.
You might try growing some peach from seed to determine if your climate and soil is conducive to peach rootstocks. It could be that since peaches love heat, they might actually perform better that Adara as a rootstock. (Spokane peach only uses peach rootstocks for all of his plums. And growers in CA often find that the Lovell peach rootstock is favored over many others.). Once you have both peach and Adara rootstocks, grow both until you can topwork the peach with Adara. The Adara can support any stonefruit you desire to grow. On a healthy peach rootstock you will be impressed with the results. Then you can determine if the rootstock was your primary issue which I expect is the case. Fowler nursery in CA sells what locals call “Puente” which is Adara on a Lovell peach rootstock. I bought three of these several years ago and they have performed very well for me.
Let me know if I can be of further assistance, or if you need more Adara of cherry plum scions this next spring.
Dennis
Kent, wa
1 Like
Did some “carving” today to see what the issue looked like and it’s not good. Something is definitely infecting the tree via lenticels. I think I’m to blame since I did a basal bark application of Garden Phos with PentraBark (which opens the lenticles so the Garden Phos can enter the tree since it is a systemic fungicide). Now I’m wondering if any scions from the top of this tree are safe to use or if they will have whatever disease this is.
Danny
1 Like
Thank you for the input Dennis. I’m wondering what is going on with these Cherries. I know I’m REALLY pushing mu luck trying to grow them in a hot & humid environment, but this tree THRIVED last year against all odds. I have a tiny Lapins growing in sandy soil that seems to be doing okay, but not thriving. This Lee is on a Mahaleb rootstock, which is the only rootstock that didn’t get rootrot last year. It was too easy to dig up the dead trees and saw the rotted roots. They did have these weird spots above ground so I’m not sure if it is related or two different issues that happened at the same time. I looked at the Mahaleb rootstock on this Lee and it looks really healthy. It even has a bud forming, which I will probably allow to grow if I have to remove all of the Lee above the graft. That’s gonna hutt but will at least give me a shot at growing Mahaleb or regrafting an avium variety below the original graft.
Out of the Adaras you gave me, none of the bare roots survived. Scions took and I have a branch forming that was grafted onto a Methley plum. I also have a Delight Cherryplum tree with Sprite grafted onto it and the leaves look very similar to Adara. I shared scions of Adara and the other variety of interstem with a friend of mine and she has both grafted onto her Santa Rosa plum. We figured we’d “multiply” the scions to have some for spring. I do have a Lee scion on Adara that is on Methley from the spring that is alive.
Peaches and plums both do really well here, so I am open to grafting Adara to either. For Lapins, I will be doing soil drenches with the Garden Phos to prevent root rot, but will no longer do the basal bark application with PentraBark. All I know for sure is that I absolutely refuse to give up on growing Cherries this far south. Where there’s a will, there’s a way, and I am determined to crack the code. I did find a tiny peach seedling that popped up, so may add Adara as an interstem. I know peach graft successful rate is probably the lowest of all mainstream Prunus species, so I’m debating letting it grow bigger first so there are multiple stems to graft onto.
I’ve debated ordering Peach & Plum rootstocks to graft Adara onto as an interstem just for Cherries. My originsl dream was an ALL-in-one Prunus tree, but I need to crack the Cherry code first before even dreaming of that again.
This Lee has Minnie Royal, Stella, Kansas Sweet, Early Burlat, and “Gold” cherry varieties successfully grafted onto it. I know I mentioned it earlier in this reply, but would grafting any of these onto the Adara end up infecting the Adara and Methley? All the spots are on the main trunk and not the higher branches.
Thanks,
Danny
1 Like
Cherry works very well on Colt here but I’ve heard mixed reviews from folks elsewhere.
1 Like
Danny
I have viewed your carving pics several times and I do not see anything abnormal! It looks like a healthy bark if it were not carved up. If you have pruning sealer use that to cover the cut areas to allow the tree to heal. Post a pic or two of your foliage so viewers can see any other infection symptoms. What exactly led you to think there is an infection? The other trees that died perhaps died of crown rot which can infect your soil. So suggest avoid replanting where you had those trees. I’m not an infection expert by any means, but I do not see signs of infection on your Lee. So if the foliage is healthy above, I see no reason why the scion wood would be unhealthy.
Dennis
Dennis, the places where I carved had dead/brown tissue underneath. The lenticels are sunken and dark and when I carve the out, I see the brown tissue underneath. The main trunk is also full of dark, sunkey areas, that when carved, are brown and dead. I will take pictures of the full tree and leaves when I get back home.
Danny
My first thought was heat damage. Are the areas affected on the south side of the tree? Are they down beneath the canopy enough to get full sun throughout the day? The sun, combined with +105 degree temperatures may use cooked the cambium, heating it beyond its ability to survive. That would explain the lack of gummosis.
1 Like
That makes a lot of sense, but what puzzles me is how the spots all start at the lenticels and spread, killing more of the trunk. All the visible/“infected” lenticels are on the main trunk and mostly on the north side but are found all around the trunk. When carving out some lenticels, I found dead tissue as shown in the pictures below the lenticels. There are none of these dark/sunken/dead spots in non-lenticel areas, which is strange to me. The tree did appear to struggle a bit during the heat dome in June, but is lushing out now. My previous cherries died in September/October of last year, and Lee was my only survivor. I feel like it may be on track to die around Sept/Oct if this keeps up. I’m not sure the tree will heal or callus over this dead tissue. There are no splits in the trunk that would indicate sunburn.
Side note: I brought home a Canada Red Chokecherry from Albuquerque and it was growing and then it suddenly developed this same issue. So maybe it is heat related? All I know is that the tree slowly started dying back despite a garden phos soil drench.
Maybe I need to start my own northern varieties from seed to see if a seedling acclimates to the environment here and then graft known varieties onto that?
Somewhat off topic, but I want to grow Prunus virginiana and Prunus serotina here as well. P. serotina does okay but barely grows. I have an Escarpment subspecies of serotina that had it’s leaves fried even in the shade last month, but it is budding out again. I’m growing Capulin from seed so we’ll see how that goes.
Danny
That’s a strong possibility, he says the foliage is healthy, so perhaps painting the tree bark with white latex is the best advice? When I lived in Tennessee it was common there to see fruit tree trunks painted. People with peach borer used lime to paint them serving two purposes. We don’t have enough sun here to take those precautions.
Dennis
1 Like
Did any of your trees with those dying spots on the lenticels not get treated with that Garden Phos/PentaBark combo? I am starting to wonder if that could in fact be the cause of your problem. You must have put a lot of phosphorous on given it is showing white, and the PentaBark could have helped it absorb through the lenticels.
Looking higher up where you did not treat are there any dead lenticel spots? If not then I think we have your culprit.
1 Like
Last year I didn’t treat any trees with that combo. Last year I lost 3 cherry trees (and again this Spring). Sudden wilt and dead leaves hanging onto the tree. It looked like Fire Blight, but prunus trees do not get that infection, so I figured root rot and that suspicion was confirmed when I dug up the trees. They did have those sunken spots throughout, but not necessarily on the lenticels. The faded white you see on the Lee trunk is leftover 3in1 IV organics paint from last summer. I do not see any dying lenticels above where I did the basal bark application (up to 5’ as per instructions), but the lenticels that far up are not visible yet either.
Danny
Here are some pictures I just took right now.
Full view of Lee with other varieties grafted onto it.
Cherry side graft with some gummosis at the end of the original scion before it grew out.
Close up of dried gummosis.
Close up of lenticels with the dark coloring.
Close up of other lenticels displaying the same thing.
Some new growth.
Looking up at the tree.
Some lower, yellowing leaves that have been falling off as new ones grow.
Another view of the yellowing (with spots) leaves.
Green leaves.
More leaves.
More new leaves.
Some spots on new leaves.
Dead leaves hanging on.
Close up of the dead/dry leaf attached to the stem.
Mahaleb rootstock, which seems to be okay.
Danny
OK nix that idea.
If the stock is good but things get bad right above the graft it could be the graft union is failing. The lenticels getting dark could just be that the dying starts there so I wouldn’t read too much into that.
Cherries don’t like hot weather so that also could be a factor. I have my cherries in afternoon shade for this reason, and I am much less hot than your climate.
So those could be two other factors. Given all those new pictures I don’t see any signs at all of bacterial canker and there is usually at least something. So probably cross that one off as well.
Do you think applying Super Thrive or any type of “instant” fertilizer will help revive it and give it a shot at surviving? I’m a bit surprised that this large tree is suffering, while my 3-4’ Lapins (planted this Spring) seems to look normal and is growing.
Danny
Danny,
I would use any of those top branch scions without any concerns about their health. For the heat waves your tree has endured, it’s in very good condition. Nor would I fertilize this late in growing season.
If you have other compatible receptor rootstocks you could perform grafting now with green scions from this tree. I expect the majority of your tree’s issues are heat related as Scott pointed out. Go with more heat tolerant rootstocks
Dennis
Kent, wa
1 Like
Dennis,
What fall temperatures are good for grafting? I am debating whether doing scion grafts or bud grafts since our temps are in the high 90s and will stay like that for at least another month. Perhaps I can cut scions and store in the fridge until Oct/Nov?
Danny
