Fire Blight

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We started seeing Fire Blight on pear trees in the area increase over the past 7-10 years, the ornamental pear trees whether it was a Bradford or Cleveland really began to be popular in a lot of landscapes and because of the high number of these trees planted we provided this disease with a great host to thrive on.

You can drive through most any sub-division and find infected trees, it is also infecting several types of flowering crab apples and other fruit trees.

There really is no prevention and the only control methods are to try to prune out infected branches which will not leave much of a tree to look at in many situations and may cause more problems as it can be carried from branch to branch on your trimmers as you try to correct the problem.

There are some products that are said to control the bacteria such as a agricultural version of streptomycin but they are expensive and the timing of the application is difficult and must be applied multiple times in the spring,

I have found that the disease comes and goes, 1 year it may be bad and the next it is not visible.

Healthy trees will have the advantage but once the tree is infected its permanent.