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| Plant Rust |
The Problem of Rust on Plants in the Garden:
This is one of the most common afflictions to blight the gardeners produce in both amateur plots and commercial sites globally. In popular usage, the term ‘rust’ is applied to brown or black spots on foliage, but a rust fungus is a plant parasite with a complex life cycle.
Rust is not, by virtue of its place in this article, a true disease and is instead a fungal spore growth. Certain rusts spend their entire life cycle on just one type of host plant and other closely related plants, while others migrate from one host to a completely unrelated host. Spores and rust spots may develop solely on the areas of infection while other varieties may become systemic, spreading through a complete stem or whole plants.Rusts can, therefore, be difficult to contain or to combat; all diseased leaves should be burnt, particularly at the end of the season to prevent over wintering of infected plants. If rust appears on perennial plants on a regular basis, however, the entire plant should be removed and destroyed as this would lead one to presume that the tissues of the plant are infected with the spores.
Specific preventative and control measures are described below, in keeping with the host plant that the rust is infecting:
Vegetables and Herbs:
rust is most prevalent on these plants when the host plant is suffering from a potassium deficiency. Correcting this deficiency may soon also control the spread of the rust. Severely damaged runner and dwarf beans should be dusted with sulphur and in the autumn, infected plants should be burnt to prevent over wintering of the spores.
Plants under Glass:
Rust under glass most often affects chrysanthemums, carnations and geraniums (particularly the latter). In the greenhouse, good practice should include regular ventilation in the winter to keep air circulation high and humidity low. Rust can also be swiftly inhibited before establishing itself by removing infected leaves and quickly destroying infected plants. They may also be sprayed with anti-fungal sprays such as maneb and thireb.
Annuals and Perennials:
If infected, these should be removed and burnt or sprayed with maneb, thiram or zineb at fortnightly intervals. Many species of particularly susceptible plants, such as antirrhinum, are now marketed as being particularly rust resistant. Many plants that have alternative foliage, such as the silverdust cineraria are also able to be infected with rust spores and will become diseased in the same way as their green leaved counterparts. Plants such as these, however, with more delicate foliage, will not always respond to chemical treatments or dusting as with their chlorophyll filled relatives.
Trees and Shrubs:
Rust on these plants usually indicates an underlying problem as establish large shrubs and trees should not be contracting rust developments. They will often fall prey to rust if they are suffering from malnutrition or from dry soil and lack of water. This can be immediately remedied by the use of mulching, watering and soil conditioning techniques too rather than fungicide deployment. |
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