While we don’t have to worry about starvation like the Irish due to lack of crop diversity, it is interesting that we are seeing the same mold that caused the Irish Potato Famine widespread in the USA now. – Anthony
Potato famine disease striking home gardens in U.S.
Reuters – Dark brown lesions on stems, with white fungal growth developing under moist conditions, are characteristic … By Julie Steenhuysen Julie Steenhuysen – Fri Jul 10, 5:22 pm ET
CHICAGO (Reuters) – Late blight, which caused the Irish Potato Famine of the 1840s and 1850s, is killing potato and tomato plants in home gardens from Maine to Ohio and threatening commercial and organic farms, U.S. plant scientists said on Friday.
“Late blight has never occurred this early and this widespread in the United States,” said Meg McGrath, a plant pathologist at Cornell University’s extension center in Riverhead, New York.
She said the fungal disease, spread by spores carried in the air, has made its way into the garden centers of large retail chains in the Northeastern United States.
“Wal-mart, Home Depot, Sears, Kmart and Lowe’s are some of the stores the plants have been seen in,” McGrath said in a telephone interview.
The disease, known officially as Phytophthora infestans, causes large mold-ringed olive-green or brown spots on plant leaves, blackened stems, and can quickly wipe out weeks of tender care in a home garden.
McGrath said in her 21 years of research, she has only seen five outbreaks in the United States. The destructive disease can spread rapidly in cooler, moist weather, infecting an entire field within days.
“What’s unique about it this year is we have never seen plants affected in garden centers being sold to home gardeners,” she said.
This year’s cool, wet weather created perfect conditions for the disease. “Hopefully, it will turn sunny,” McGrath said. “If we get into our real summer hot dry weather, this disease is going to slow way down.”
FUNGICIDES WILL CONTROL BLIGHT
According to its website, the University Maryland’s Plant Diagnostic Lab got a suspect tomato sample as early as June 12, very early in the tomato growing season, which runs from April-September.
McGrath said the risk is that many gardeners will not recognize it, putting commercial farms and especially organic growers at risk.
“My concern is for growers. They are going to have to put a lot more time and effort in trying to control the disease. It’s going to be a very tough year,” she said.
“This pathogen can move great distances in the air. It often does little jumps, but it can make some big leaps.”
McGrath said the impact on the farmer will depend on how much the pathogen is spread. “Eastern New York is seeing a lot of disease,” she said.
She said commercial farmers will be able to use fungicides containing chlorothalonil to control the blight.
And while some sprays have also been approved for organic use, many organic farmers do not use them, making it much harder to control.
“If they are not on top of this right from the very beginning, it can go very fast,” she said.
I friend of mine is so proud of her tom plant. It is luscious green with lots and lots of leaves. Not a single blossom has opened yet. What she doesn’t know is that she won’t even have green tomatoes at this rate.
I’m in East Texas, which isn’t *quite* as dry as South Texas but still, there are burn bans in place in most of the counties around me.
I *think* what’s driving both the cool, wet weather in the north and the dry weather here in Texas is the shift in the jet stream, which has changed or at least greatly exaggerated the weather tendencies in the various regions. Humid, storm producing air masses which would have come across Texas in the summer in other years are headed farther north, and we’re getting hot, dry, air from the arid chihuahuan and sonoran highlands instead.
At least that’s my hypothesis. I wonder if someone with more expertise could tell me whether it has any merit.
Potato blight is still taken very very seriously in Ireland and Met Eireann ( The Irish weather service) regulary post “blight conditions” warnings on their website. There is one in force this weekend!
Oh my, look at this
http://www.bom.gov.au/climate/enso/
Seems like the SOI index has just spat at the ENSO models, they expected SOI to drop again as El Nino continues to form, instead it did a sharp tick upwards.
The TAO site shows the warm waters with an anomaly of 1 or above now rounded up in a ballooon shape with no hold at the right of the map, the depth comparison shows cooler water seemingly welling up at the far right, the 20C depth comparison shows a weaker warm pool also more towards the middle than last year.
Seems more likely it’ll prove the dire warnings of El Nino wrong meaning not much of a winter warming effect globally as a result and thus could mean earlier freezes and colder weather. Unfortunately it could mean more potato blight like mentioned here for those whose livelyhoods are dependent on the tomato crop.
Also Intellicast is showing the worst of the heatwave here in Kansas is over and it will end within 5 days with temperatures more seasonable (which still means low to mid 90’s), apparently though Texas may or may not join in on that kind of relief.
@ur momisugly Tom in Texas (09:49:08) :
Tom, that’s probably because the weather in Texas (at least in Dallas) is nothing unprecedented at all. Just normal weather.
http://www.weather.com/weather/monthly/USTX0327?from=36hr_topnav_undeclared
Now, that is not to say they aren’t have a drought problem. That may be true, however, I am doubting that it is from abnormally high temperatures pursue. For the month of July, there have only been 5 days in triple digits, highest being 103, the rest being 101, 101, 102, 103, 102. Forecast for a two more days next week at 102. Doesn’t look too unusual to me!
Please check the facts:
From wiki:
[edit] Environmental conditions
There are several environmental conditions that are conducive to P. infestans. By using weather forecasting systems, such as BLITECAST, if the following conditions occur as the canopy of the crop closes, then the use of fungicides is recommended to prevent an epidemic.[5]
A Beaumont Period is a period of 48 consecutive hours, in at least 46 of which the hourly readings of temperature and relative humidity at a given place have not been less than 20 °C (68 °F) and 75%, respectively.[6]
A Smith Period is at least two consecutive days where min temperature is 10 °C (50 °F) or above and on each day at least 11 hours when the relative humidity is greater than 90%.[7]
The temperature has to be ABOVE 10C/20C and humid.
It is not cold damp conditions!
It originated in mexico and was transported to belgium from US in seed potatos. The us and others have used it as a biological weapon.
http://randd.defra.gov.uk/Document.aspx?Document=HP0134_1156_FRP.doc
seems to suggest no growth at 25C and reduced growth at 12C. 17C seems good.
wws, you are exactly right.
Blight and diseases are the problem with most of the monoculture plants we create in the United States. Diversity has been lost and we are set up for a grape vine style die off for wheat, corn, soy, tomatoes and potatoes. Since GMO (gene modified organisms) plants carry a dominant gene, even if you plant diversity too near a gmo field, you end up with gmo plants.
Oh and did you know that the definition of organic has been changed to include GMOs? Control the food, control the world.
http://www.cnr.berkeley.edu/~agroeco3/index.html
Most of the U.S. has had a cooler than normal summer so far. Especially the Northeast, Midwest, and Intermountain West.
Since June 1, Denver (where I live) has seen just three 90+ days, with a max temp of 92. The only summer since 1950 with a greater lack of heat was 1967, which didn’t record it’s first 90 degree day until July 21.
ron from Texas (11:25:25) :
Someone said that weather is not climate. That’s a bit of misdirection, imo. Weather happens in a climate. If the climate is cool, weather will have various effects in that overall cycle, at least locally. Saying that weather is not climate doesn’t actually prove anything nor does it prove AGW.
Compare climate and weather with a metazoan. Each cell is weather and the whole organism is climate. There are many metazoan individuals; each individual is a particular climate. All the individuals conform a population, which in our comparison would be one of the climate spheres (climatic systems), i.e. cryosphere, biosphere, hydrosphere, lithosphere. All the populations shape the world; the four climatic systems outline the Earth’s climate or global climate.
The current “climate change” is not global and impinges exclusively on some biomes of the Northern Hemisphere. Go see the Anahuac Plateau, for example. Its climate has not changed by a dust grain in the last 70 years. 🙂
“Doesn’t look too unusual to me!”
I’ve lived in San Antonio for 30 years and will disagree with you about triple digit days. Usually you can count them on one hand. This summer they started in mid June (Aug is usually our hottest month) and continue every day.
Not to mention that the humidity raises the “heat index” by an additional 4-5°F.
I remember one year (1980?) we had 40 days of triple digits, so this year is not unpresedented, but it is unusual.
I will add that the San Antonio temperature sensor is surrounded by runways,
freeways and cloverleafs, but on the other hand I happen to live nearby that sensor.
“Ireland of the 1840’s and it’s struggle with the British empire and Thomas Malthus.”
Poor Malthus was fourteen years dead in 1848.
1848 was a year of crop failures throughout Europe, and also a year of bloody revolutionary ferment. The two stories are obviously related.
Tom in Texas (13:13:48) :
I’ve lived in San Antonio for 30 years and will disagree with you about triple digit days. Usually you can count them on one hand. This summer they started in mid June (Aug is usually our hottest month) and continue every day.
Not to mention that the humidity raises the “heat index” by an additional 4-5°F.
I remember one year (1980?) we had 40 days of triple digits, so this year is not unpresedented, but it is unusual.
I will add that the San Antonio temperature sensor is surrounded by runways,
freeways and cloverleafs, but on the other hand I happen to live nearby that sensor.
Agree… However, from my earliest recalls, San Antonio has been the waiting-room of hell; Laredo is the hell. The difference is more asphalt and concrete and less forested areas. The city has grown hastily in the last 20 years.
The source for the following comments is this book:
Paddy’s Lament, Ireland 1846-1847: Prelude to Hatred
http://www.amazon.com/Paddys-Lament-Ireland-1846-1847-Prelude/dp/0156707004
The Irish potato famine was not an isolated Irish problem but a failure of the potato croup throughout Europe, including England. Every country in Europe, including England, imposed restrictions on food exports, except for Ireland, which was governed by England. At the height of the famine Ireland was the major food exporting country in Europe the food being sent to feed the British armies around the world.
At a minimum one million Irish died of the famine and the actual numbers are most likely much higher as many of the dead were not counted. Ireland went from a population of over eight million to just over four million with over half of the loss being attributed to emigration. As the Irish Census records were destroyed in the Irish Revolution of June 1922, by IRA military action, the full extent of the carnage will never been know accurately.
In studying the impact of climate on the Irish Potato Famine, remember that this was a European wide problem and not just endemic to the Ireland. The story that the Irish were too stupid to grow anything but potatoes is part of the genocide cover-up.
Mike
Couldn’t plants be genetically engineered to be more blight- and drought- resistant? I would suspect that is well within the abilities of current bio-engineering.
I am a disinterested commentator here, by the way; my preference in tubers is for yams and sweet potatoes.
On the heels of the salmonella-spinach scare of last year, Isn’t this another black eye at least for large-scale ‘organic’ farming? The prudent use of chemical pesticides is surely one of the major guarantors of the food supply in a market of 300 million people.
You think I should cc this to Greenpeace?
“On the heels …, Isn’t this another black eye.
Badly mixed metaphor there. What would George Orwell say (v. ‘Politics and the English Language’)?
‘The temperature has to be ABOVE 10C/20C and humid.’
Where is it that 10 C in July is not cold? Certainly not in the I-95 Corridor from DC to Boston. Yesterday’s morning low of 58F (14.5 C) at Newark Airport set the record for the date. Normal low temp. now, just about at the peak of average temps., is 70F (21C).
The first ten days of July have all been below normal, for an average anomaly of -4.4.
Y’all down in San Antonio can just keep your mother-luvin’ heatwave. I haven’t felt this good in July since 2004!
FWIW, we got zapped with ‘early blight’ here in Louisiana. It’s a different fungus, but sucks just about as much, attacking tomatoes and potatoes with wild abandon. Daconil slows both blights dramatically, in case you’ve got one of them.
But let’s not confuse the issue here. These fungi have no concern for global warming. They grow when it’s humid. That’s pretty much their only concern. My guess is that I bought potato seed (which are really just plain old potatoes) that was inoculated with the crap already. I suspect it is the same for everyone else suffering from the fungus.
The bad news is, the fungus can go dormant for three frickin’ years, so if you want to kill it off, you’ve got to not plant tomatoes or potatoes for at least 4 years!
&^%#$$*%$!
I put my Yukon Gold potatoes in early this year (April 25th) and they’re ready to dig already. Curiously, they never bloomed this year.
“‘Wet and *warm* weather, not cool weather is causing explosive spread of blight. Thunderstorm weather, actually.’ ”
Thunderstorms, at least in the Northeast, are usually caused by pressing cold fronts. Despite this extraordinarily cool early summer, there have been episodes of dramatic, electrifying weather hereabouts as wave after wave of cooler, low-dewpoint air masses (one morning early this week, the dewpoint at EWR was 47F–in July!) have moved into masses less cool and with much-higher dewpoints. On separate occasions, towns in northern NJ and more recently in southern Westchester County, NY (maybe ten miles from the George Washington Bridge) have seen hail-producing t-storms so heavy that plows had to be deployed.
” Oh and did you know that the definition of organic has been changed to include GMOs? Control the food, control the world. ”
“More like ‘control the language, control the world”.
Anyway, the word ‘organic’ has a wide field of reference.
Weather in North America over the past year or so has been classic La Nina.
Cool in western Canada and upper mid-west – cool and wet in the north-east – dry and warm in the south – dry in California – wet along the north-west coast.
[Remember there is a lag of 2 to 3 months for the impact to be felt so we are still feeling the La Nina versus the El Nino which has just developed].
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/2c/La_Nina_regional_impacts.gif
Liberals wackos and word games.
Has any one eaten Inorganic veges? Last time I checked, they are all organic.
Global warming is climate chance. We have climate change more often than changes in seasons.
Cooling is much more dangerous to us than warming. Unfortunately there is nothing the politicians can “control” to reduce global cooling.
Off topic but Anthony, did you read Senator Fielding’s Due Diligence report? The independant Senator is going to vote against Australias cap and trade, as described in Christopher Booker’s latest Telegraph article.