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Welcome to Tree Fruit Disease Updates Blog

Welcome to the Acimovic Lab's Tree Fruit Disease Updates blog. Acimovic Laboratory is located at the Virginia Tech's Alson H. Smith Jr. Agricultural Research and Extension Center (AREC) in Winchester, VA. As a branch of Virginia Tech's School of Plant and Environmental Sciences and Virginia Agricultural Experiment Station (VAES) our program involves research and extension focused on diseases of fruit tree crops with emphasis on apple, pear, peach and cherries. We investigate all components of the disease triangle: pathogen, plant, and the environment in order to better understand their interactions that serve as a necessary basis to develop new disease management strategies. As a part of the VAES, AREC in Winchester is a valuable source of cutting edge research-based information that is constantly provided to Virginia farmers through extension meetings, presentation, educational programs and field days organized by the Virginia Cooperative Extension and participating associations.

In collaboration with faculty at AREC, Acimovic Lab provides rounded support to stakeholders addressing both scientific and practical aspects of plant, insect and disease management. This blog is an integral part of this collaboration and provides direct access to current and past information on key strategies for reducing fruit crop losses from key pathogens and insect pests in the state of Virginia. Acimovic Lab is leading the edge in plant pathology research and extension addressing current and future challenges of fruit production such as new fruit tree pathogens, plant pathogen resistance to biocides, sustainable plant protection practices, and growing complications associated with climate change. Some of the key foci of applied and basic research conducted in Acimovic Lab are fungicide and bactericide efficacy trials in the field and in vitro, evaluation of management options for pre- and post-harvest apple pathogens, plant defense responses, and survival, physiology, and population dynamics of fire blight bacterium Erwinia amylovora under different stresses. Our goal is to provide new tools for plant disease management and bring new basic knowledge in the areas of plant pathogen biology, epidemiology, and ecology that will serve as basis to improve existing disease prediction models, develop new management strategies, and allow more accurate and precise application of different control options thus securing high efficiency. Our program is designed to help farmers maintain both the fruit quantity and quality while using disease management options that are environmentally friendly and at the same time acceptable for consumer markets. Finally, since every growing season is different, along with the climate type specific differences in Virginia regions, AREC has an important role to provide valuable time sensitive and year-specific information on disease prediction and occurrence to the agricultural community. This site is one of many on-demand resources for plant protection information available from Virginia Tech.

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First Symptoms of Sooty Blotch & Flyspeck and Apple Blotch Disease Visible in Virginia: 22 July 2021

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