February 2024 First Friday with Florida First Detector

Recap of February 2024 First Friday with Florida First Detector

In this month’s webinar, we talked about plant pathogens. A pathogen is any organism that causes disease. Some pathogens that can impact plants include fungi, bacteria, viruses, nematodes and more. When we are checking our plants for issues, we look for both signs and symptoms. Symptoms are a visible change in the plant like yellowing, necrotic spots, dieback, etc. Signs are physical evidence that a pathogen is present. In the plant pathogen world, this can be something like fungal bodies, spores, bacterial exudates, and others.

While the pathogen is the causal agent, the disease is how the plant is impacted. We looked at several examples of plant diseases in this webinar including boxwood blight, sudden oak death, citrus greening, lethal bronzing, rose rosette virus, red ring disease and more. Many of these have been recently causing a lot of trouble for our agriculture and horticulture industries! Several of the related pathogens are not currently found in Florida like the red ring nematode, Ralstonia solanacearum R3B2, and Phytophthora ramorum.

Identification of plant pathogens can be challenging! For many plant pathogens, laboratory diagnostic testing is needed. If you are seeing unusual symptoms on plants, especially something you haven’t seen before, connect with your local county extension office. A sample submission may be recommended for proper identification and management recommendations.

Resources on invasive plant pathogens

Diagnostic Services at UF

UF IFAS Plant Diagnostics Clinic
UF Fort Lauderdale REC, Dr. Brian Bahder’s lab, Diagnostic testing for lethal bronzing and lethal yellowing on palms

Want to watch the recording?

What is the upcoming schedule?

We are meeting online via Zoom from 12:00PM-1:00PM on the First Friday of every month from Sept 2022-Aug 2024. Please visit this blog for registration information and the upcoming schedule for Sept 2023-2024.

Questions?

Contact Dr. Morgan Pinkerton, morgan0402@ufl.edu

Visit the Florida First Detector Website