Contents
In terms of its biological properties, the pear is close to the apple tree, but more thermophilic. She lives up to 130 years and is considered a long-liver among fruit trees. It is all the more offensive when pears rot on a tree, crack, blacken or fall off. This can destroy the crop, at best – significantly reduces it and makes the fruit unsuitable for storage. Mistresses cannot process spoiled pears, and farmers lose their profits.
Why do pears crack and rot on a tree
Most often, rotting pears on a tree causes moniliosis. But this is not the only reason for crop damage. Insects can “work” on fruits, proper care of the garden is of great importance, and no one has canceled other diseases. For example, cracking of pear fruits occurs due to scab.
destroyed
One of the most common diseases of pome fruit crops is scab. If this microscopic fungus begins to develop in the spring, pear leaves are the first to suffer, they turn black and fall off by mid-summer. Most of the ovaries die.
But often the trees are affected in the middle of the season. Then the fungus affects the leaves less, but the fruits first become covered with dark spots, then crack, take on an ugly shape and stop developing. If an infection gets into the wound, the pears not only burst, but also rot. Often it is the scab that precedes the disease of the tree with moniliosis.
The fungus is widespread in all regions where pome crops grow, it affects stone fruits less. The spread of the disease is facilitated by damp warm weather.
The bend hibernates on the bark of affected shoots and infected leaves. As a preventive measure, standard sanitary measures are recommended, for treatment – repeated spraying with copper-containing and difenoconazole-based preparations.
Moniliasis
But the most common and intractable reason why pear fruits crack and rot on a tree is moniliosis. The disease is caused by a fungus of the genus Monilia, it manifests itself in two forms:
- fruit rot, affecting fruits that have already formed in the middle of summer, poses the greatest danger to pome crops;
- monilial burn of young vegetative organs: leaves, shoots, flowers, ovaries – manifests itself in spring and causes the greatest damage to stone fruits.
External manifestations of fruit monilial rot become noticeable after pouring pears. Small brown spots appear on the fruit, spreading very quickly and covering the entire surface. The further development of the disease can go according to one of two scenarios:
- High humidity encourages spore development. On pears, yellowish or grayish pads appear, arranged randomly or in circles – this depends on the type of fungus of the genus Monilia that affected the culture.
- At low humidity, spores are not formed. Pears dry and blacken, but do not fall from the tree.
Sick fruits in contact with healthy vegetative organs infect them, if contact occurs with a branch, dark oval spots appear on the bark. When they accumulate, the top of the shoot dries out.
The mycelium of the infectious agent overwinters on mummified pears, fallen leaves and affected branches. As soon as the temperature reaches 12°C, the fungus begins to grow. At this time, the causative agent of molinium burn is activated, fruit rot conidia need more heat – 24 ° C.
The infection is spread by wind, insects, along with raindrops flowing down, through the touch of people and animals. Infection of a pear with scab opens a real gate for moniliosis. It is on this culture, due to the thin peel, that both infections affect the fruits at the same time. First, because of the scab, the pear cracks, and rots on the branch already thanks to moniliosis.
How to save the harvest
Depending on the degree of damage to pears, 20-70% of the crop is lost due to moniliosis. Infected, but plucked at the initial stages of the disease, the fruits are poorly stored and quickly begin to rot. It is difficult to fight moniliosis, it is impossible to prevent it, since spores can even be carried by the wind. Spraying is effective only at the initial stage. Severely affected trees require complex measures – a combination of chemical treatments, pruning and sanitary measures.
Agricultural practices
The plant protection system can only work with the proper application of agricultural practices. The most important are:
- proper layout of the garden – the free placement of trees will make it difficult to transfer the infection from one plant to another;
- planting varieties resistant to moniliosis – now they are quite enough to satisfy the most fastidious gardener;
- timely pruning of trees – the removal of dry, diseased and thickening crown branches not only destroys infected vegetative organs, but also makes treatments more effective;
- compliance with the feeding schedule: properly selected doses of phosphorus and potassium make the leaves and fruit peel stronger and more resilient, infections are more difficult to infiltrate into them than into flabby and weakened ones;
- digging the trunk circle in spring and autumn not only saturates the soil with oxygen, allows the tree to better absorb nutrients or water, but also destroys fungal spores wintering in the soil;
- sanitary measures – removal from the site of dry leaves and mummified fruits, on which the mycelium of monilial fungi hibernates, prevents the development of the disease in the new season;
- autumn moisture recharge allows pears to overwinter better, because of this, their tissues become stronger and less permeable to infection.
Chemicals
Fungicide treatment is most effective in the early stages of the disease. If the tree has been severely affected by moniliosis, the pears burst and rot in rainy weather, or turn black and dry in the absence of rain for a long time, you will have to cut off the infected fruits in order to save part of the crop. Full protection against the disease looks like this:
- before bud break, the pear is treated with a copper-containing preparation;
- on a pink cone (during the nomination of peduncles) and immediately after flowering – fungicides such as Horus, Skor, or other drugs based on difenoconazole or cyprodinil;
- when the pears begin to pour, two more fungicide treatments are needed with an interval of 14 days;
- after leaf fall – spraying the tree with copper-containing preparations in high concentration.
If the pear is severely affected, more than 2 treatments may be required in the summer. They should be done at least two weeks apart. The last spraying should not be done later than 15 days before harvest.
Biological agents
Protection of pears from fruit rotting by biological methods does not cancel the treatment with copper-containing preparations at the beginning and end of the season. In the middle of the growing season, to combat moniliosis, you can use:
- Fitosporin-M;
- Alirin;
- Mikosan;
- Fitolavin.
As auxiliary preparations, epin or zircon are added to the spray bottle.
Folk methods
There are no effective folk ways to deal with pear moniliosis. It is better not to waste time on them.
preventive measures
Proper agricultural technology is the best prevention of rotting pear fruits. To what is written in the chapter “Agrotechnical methods”, early spring and late autumn treatment of the tree with copper-containing preparations should be added.
Sometimes gardeners complain that treatments are ineffective. Some even indicate the reason – a blue precipitate remains at the bottom of the cylinder, therefore, copper does not dissolve well and does not fall on the tree. To make your life easier, you can buy drugs that the manufacturer produces in the form of an emulsion, for example, Kuproksat.
What else can cause fruit rot
Sometimes pears rot right on the tree, not because of some terrible disease, but because of poor-quality planting material, ignorance of the characteristics of the variety by the owners, or banal non-compliance with elementary rules of care. Before proceeding with the long and difficult treatment of a fungal disease or destroying a tree, the source of the problem should be identified.
Grade feature
Some old varieties have such a feature – pears, not having time to ripen, soften from the inside. If the fruit is cut, the outer layer will still be hard, and in the middle – a real porridge. By the time the pear acquires its characteristic color and aroma, inside there is no longer a semi-liquid mass, but rot.
This feature is caused by the imperfection of the variety and went to the culture from wild ancestors. So the pear accelerates the ripening of seeds, and they germinate very quickly. Modern cultivars are usually devoid of such a disadvantage.
Which exit? It is better to regraft the tree. You can collect pears when they have not had time to soften from the inside, put in a dark, cool place for ripening. If the fruits are whole and tasty, this should be done in subsequent seasons. But as soon as the pears are rotten inside anyway, the variety needs to be changed.
Wrong picking time
Late varieties of pears must be harvested at the stage of technical ripeness. Consumer they reach during storage. Those gardeners who do not pay attention to this, and wait for the fruits to ripen on the tree, risk being left without a harvest.
Overflow
It seems that everyone knows – you can’t pour a pear. In all articles devoted to culture, they write this warning. But even experienced gardeners sometimes step on the banal “rake” of watering.
Perhaps at least once the issue should be given a little more attention than usual. And in order for the essence of the problem to become clear even to novice gardeners, and the experienced “saw the light”, it is better to do this with a specific example.
On a small (or very extensive) site there is always not enough space. The owners are in search every season – they are trying to carve out at least a small piece of land for a new culture. Here they brought forest strawberries adapted for the garden to the plot. Where to put her? And over there, under the pear tree, the earth “walks”! And strawberries tolerate partial shade well.
The culture took root, grew, blossomed. Handsomely! And in the summer it began to dry out right with the berries – there is not enough water. Let’s water it, we need to save the harvest. What about a pear? She’s a tree, a couple of extra watering will withstand.
So they pour water under the pear tree twice a week, and nothing seems to be done to it. It’s time to harvest. And the pears inside rot on the tree! No, no, it’s not because the tree was drowned in water, it’s a bad variety! Let’s regraft the pear!
The next variety will be the same. So what? The gardener complains that he has no luck with pears. Well, no matter what, all one rot grows. Even from the chibouks, personally taken from a neighbor who treats everyone she knows with beautiful sweet fruits, nothing good came of it. Well, just some kind of mystic!
insect sting
Often pears damage wasps – an infection gets into the place of an insect injection, the fetus rots. To prevent this from happening, the harvest must be harvested on time and the fruits should not be allowed to overripe.
But not always the striped pest is attracted by the aroma of ripe fruits. A wasp can fly to the smell left by the hands of an unlucky gardener who first picked other fruits or berries, and then for some reason decided to feel the pear. This happens quite often.
Weather disasters
A strong wind, swinging heavy pears, can damage them in the stalk area. If moniliosis spores or another infection gets there, the fetus will begin to rot. It is not for nothing that in all the recommendations for choosing a site for planting trees it is written: “a place protected from the wind.”
Hail, which can begin every few years in the summer even in the southern regions, damages not only pears, but also other crops. It is impossible to predict or protect yourself from it, but you need to treat it like a natural disaster. What city is.
Conclusion
Pears rot on a tree for various reasons. They need to be fought, but it is impossible to completely protect fruit trees from moniliosis. Proper agricultural practices, timely sanitary measures and preventive spraying will significantly reduce the harm caused by the disease.