Monitoring methods and spatial patterns of European canker disease in commercial orchards

Abstract

European canker (Neonectria ditissima) kills trees and decreases production in apple orchards To determine a level of disease control or the extent of its spread in commercial orchards efficient monitoring methods are required In this study we investigated two monitoring methods sampling a single row and systematic sampling of an orchard block The spatial pattern of disease within blocks and whether this changes over time was also investigated The accuracy of singlerow monitoring depended on the level of canker in the orchard and the patchiness of the distribution of infected trees However singlerow monitoring tracked changes over time in incidence severity and type of canker sufficiently well and was efficient The spatial patterns of disease incidence across the blocks were nonrandom but showed hotspots which did not change significantly over time