Hello all, welcome to WFHR's Rapids Report for this May 15th, 2025.
Thanks so much for joining us.
In studio today, we have our great friend from UW Extension, Janelle Weir, Janelle, good
to have you with us.
Well, thanks for having me, of course.
I tell you every time you're in, how much I enjoy talking with you and love hanging
out.
I learn stuff all the time and I know I'm not alone, not even just me and my dad, but
so many other people out there do.
And you got a great topic for us today.
Yeah, I'm really excited.
So the state plant pathologist, Dr. Brian Huddleston, just recently put together a fact
sheet of plant problems to keep your eye out for 2025.
And so I'm just kind of taking his lead and taking his information and sharing it with
my local community.
So today, we're going to talk about, like I said, plant problems that, you know, because
of the way things have happened in the previous years, as well as, you know, what the forecast
is looking like for this summer, what we should be keeping our eye out for.
But before we jump into specific plant diseases, I just want to take a second and talk a little
bit about this thing called the disease triangle, okay?
So for a disease to happen, for a disease to express itself, you need three things, okay?
So this is what I'm saying.
It's a disease triangle.
You need three different sides.
Now, on the first side, you need some sort of plant that is genetically susceptible to
the disease.
Okay?
Then, so not all plants are susceptible to all diseases, right?
So we've got our diseases that, you know, needs to have a real specific genetics, right?
Next, we have to have the pathogen.
We've got to have that disease causing organism.
If that disease causing organism isn't in the environment, well, the disease isn't going
to show up, right?
And then, finally, that last side of the triangle is a favorable environment.
So if you think about it, you know, we don't have powdery mildew in the middle of winter,
right?
Because it's cold, you know, you have to have really, really humid and warm conditions
for powdery mildew.
So for each one of these diseases, we have to have real specific situations or environmental
conditions for them to pop up.
So as we talk about each one of these diseases, and I mentioned, I kind of go through, how
do you go about, you know, curing this disease?
I want you to kind of just keep it thinking about how that relates to that disease triangle
because I'm going to either mention, you know, plant disease resistant varieties, right?
That's really getting at the susceptible genetics, right?
Or I'm going to mention pruning for better airflow.
That's how we're changing the environment and making it so it's not so favorable, right?
Or what's their other side, oh, I might mention, hey, prune out the disease.
Well, that would be getting rid of the pathogen, right?
Right.
Okay.
All right.
So just kind of thinking about that as we go through these different diseases and how,
when I talk about how to get rid of them, I don't know if a lot of people did this,
but certainly during the pandemic, I got into researching and finding out more and more
about these virus hunters and the people that go around the world, you know,
trying to find actual viruses before they turn into a pandemic and some of these things
and doing some of the most important work in our planet right now.
And I wound up a rabbit hole with this and still have to a time.
And I immediately hear a very similar triangle with the human beings and diseases
as plants and diseases.
It's just, I think it helps a little bit of understanding of what we're going to get into here.
Yeah.
A lot of that stuff, you know, I mean, it's biological, so it relates, you know,
across different, yeah, across different species.
It also just speaks to, I think for me, at least, how much we have in common with the planet
and our nature in general and everything.
I think that there's a lot more connection, a lot more parallels than we realize sometimes.
As sometimes we as a society get farther and farther away from just the dirt.
I think that we forget that we're part of this planet.
And we're part of this stuff and, you know, what effects it affects us.
We are nature, nature is in our built environments for sure.
Yeah, so, you know, where do you want to start with such a big topic?
Yeah, why don't we talk about scab?
Um, so scab is going to affect your apples, your crab apples and your pear plants.
Um, you know, we had a lot last year, but it's a super, super rainy spring and early summer, right?
And so, I mean, really, really what?
And so last year, we had a lot of scab problems.
I would expect because we had so much scab last year, this year for it to continue to be a problem.
Now, um, how would you know that you've got scab, note number one,
you're growing either an apple, crab apple or a pear, right?
Um, so it's not going to affect your cherry tree or anything else.
Um, it's a, how do you know?
Well, you're going to notice these little feathery edge spots on leaves and then,
and the fruits too.
And then eventually, if you had an apple or a crab apple that really lost, um, you know,
many or most of its leaves last year, probably had scab.
Huh.
So what do you do?
Uh-huh.
Um, well, one thing to know, uh, this particular disease,
I love it when I have good news when it comes to plant diseases.
This one's not lethal.
This one's mostly a cosmetic disease.
Um, and now don't get me wrong if you've got an ornamental crab apple in your front yard,
and it drops its leaves in the middle of summer every year, you know, that's even,
even if I tell you it's not lethal, you're still not happy about it, right?
It still doesn't look good, but it truly is mostly a cosmetic disease.
It can become a problem if year after year after year,
it's losing its leaves, that's going to stress the tree out.
Take a toll.
Yeah.
So, you know, from first year, you know, you have scab, don't panic.
Hmm.
Four years in a row of having serious scab.
Well, then I think we need to step in and do something.
So you just get a can of scab gone, right?
I don't know what I'm talking about.
Um, so what I would do is I would, number one, uh, good, do a good fall clean up.
In the fall, you want to get rid of as many of those leaves as possible.
See the reason why the scab keeps coming back from one year to the next is because of, um,
it overwinteres on that leaf material.
So if you get rid of all of those dead leaves, there's less of the pathogen available
to reinfect the plant the next year.
Sometimes you say things and it's like, oh, yeah, of course, yeah, yeah, it makes such sense, yes.
And the other thing I would suggest is, um, really, uh, in right around the best time to do this
would have been back around St. Patrick's Day, uh, pruning that tree, um, and opening up the canopy.
So that way it'll, um, it will dry out more quickly after the rain.
This makes it so that way, um, well, the environment's not as, uh, fantastic for it to even if the
pathogen is around, we need that environment to be favorable for the disease.
So that combination of getting rid of those leaves and then opening up that canopy is going to
make it so that way it's much less likely to happen. Now if you have had a serious defoliation
from your plants for say four years in a row and now we're looking at, you know, I'm concerned
about, um, the overall stress of my tree and it becoming susceptible to other diseases or insect
issues, then it may be worthwhile to look into applying a fungicide preventatively.
But first, let's, let's make sure that we're taking care of these other things first.
What about, uh, leaf spots and some of that, uh, that can be another one that I think is, uh,
I don't want to, I don't want to say common, but one that we kind of notice.
Well, yeah, and especially right around in our area, um, so this is, uh, this, in particular,
I'm thinking about septoria leaf spot on lilac trees. So the past few years, um,
in the Wisconsin Rapids area, in particular, Wisconsin Rapids and Acusa, um, right around there,
uh, they've really, the lilacs have really taken a toll, um, you know, you'll notice probably,
depending on the year late July into August, all of a sudden the lilacs are just completely
defoliating, right? And last year, they even managed to come back, um, they, I think some of them
bloomed again, but many of them refoliated, grew back their leaves, and then boom, lost their
leaves a second time too. Yeah. So I'm not, I don't know if I knew that that could happen. Yeah. Yeah.
So they got reinfected with the disease. Um, across the state last year, just because of the
weather conditions, um, the whole state saw really bad, uh, septoria on, on lilacs. Um,
but I want to say the issue in, uh, it has been particularly bad in our area, at least going
back four years or so. So, um, what are we going to do about this? Well, good news is, again,
mostly a cosmetic issue, except when it keeps happening over and over and over again. So same
as before, we want to do a good fall cleanup, get rid of those leaves. And if, if your leaves are,
are, uh, falling off of your lilac in the middle of summer, get out there and rake then, okay,
get it, you want to get those leaves. You don't want any of those, that plant material to overwinter.
And then pruning for that airflow, that's really going to be the best thing that you can do. A lot of
people will, you know, in, say, September, they'll call me and tell me that their, uh, lilacs are
all dried up and dying and what to do about it then. At that point, fungicides, they're not going
to work. They're not curative. They only work preventatively. So if you wait until your trees
or your shrub is all brown and dried up, it's already too late. It's good to know. Um, and, you know,
again, I think one of the things that I'm taking as a positive for a lot of this stuff is the, so much
of this, it's not, the plant is not, the tree is not dead. It's not, you know, they're salvageable.
I, that doesn't feel like the right term I want to use, but there's still something there that can
be, you can be helped. Oh, that's, you know, well, often if she just don't do anything, it'll be fine,
right? So I have a, an office colleague up in Wasa who just earlier this week mentioned to me,
Janelle, um, you know what, my lilac tree, it's all butted out and it's going to bloom, you know,
and she's, uh, she came to me last year, lilacs were all looking dead. What could she do? And I
told her, you know, what, exactly what I just said, you know, uh, uh, do a good, you know,
raking up the leaves right now in the spring or in the late winter, you know, prune them for airflow.
I don't think she did the pruning for airflow. I'm not even sure if she did any raking. But
they're, they're gonna be just fine. Now they, if she didn't prune for airflow and if she didn't
do the raking, then later on this summer, the, um, the tree or the, the shrub might be re-infected by
the disease and, you know, but it'll, it'll leave out again. It's just interesting, just very,
uh, very interesting. Uh, where would you like to go next year? Let's talk about aster yellows.
So aster yellows are a bunch of perennial plants that, um, that get aster yellows. And the way
that you're gonna know that you have them is you're gonna have this kind of weird, um, stunted and
distorted growth. Um, and the leaves can either be yellow or orange or purple in color and your
flowers almost look like they have leaves growing out of them. So the unfortunate thing about aster yellows
is, um, what we're dealing with here is, um, I think it's a virus, um, or a phytoplasma.
The unfortunate thing is it, there's no cure. If your, say, your, uh, uh, purple comb flowers have
aster yellows, there's no cure. The only thing that you can do is, um, pull them out and you
remove as much of that plant material as possible. The way that plants get aster yellows is through
leaf hoppers and, um, it's, it's because leaf hoppers don't brush their teeth from plant to plant.
And so they will have the disease, they'll have the phytoplasm in their, uh, their mouth structures,
I guess. Um, and then they share it as they go from one plant to the next. Now here's the thing
I would strongly recommend, um, having the, um, having your plants, if you suspect that you've
got aster yellows, I would strongly recommend having that checked out and, and verified that
that's what you're dealing with because, um, aster yellows looks real similar to herbicide damage.
And also to a very specific type of mite damage. Now the thing about the herbicide and the mite
damages, you can prune both of those out and they're going to be perfectly fine. Okay. So you might,
you know, I would, you know, suggest, hey, let's double check them before you rip out all of your
plants. Let's double check and make sure that it's truly this lethal disease and not, you know,
just a real bad bug infection. It's a, that's a great, and it's going to save you not only time and
effort and all these things, but, you know, maybe the plant that you love, uh, that until we can get
tree hoppers tooth brushes. That's really what we should really be focusing on or maybe mouthwash
is better. What do that's ridiculous? New toothbrushes mouthwash is what we should be doing.
Uh, we are speaking with, uh, UW extensions. Now we're right now. And Janelle, uh, this next one,
you can say, no, I'm sorry. I was going to try to set you up and I'm like, oh, no.
Uh, so yeah, we're going to talk about gymneosporangie rusts.
Gymno, genome spanner. So I, I just kind of like open up my mouth and launch at it. I, I don't think I
can slow down. I'm over thinking it. Yeah. Gymno, sporangium. Got seen out. No, you got me. I'm so sorry.
It's on me. That's on me. Uh, but this is, this is another one that I think is a great topic.
So this one, um, actually, as I was kind of going through and, and, and thinking about all of these,
I thought I was thinking about you in particular with this one because I think you're going to
really dig this. Okay. So these are, um, you know, these really, really, really show just how boring
human beings are, like utterly boring we are, right? Because there's organisms that do, um,
well, let me back up for a second. We're born, we're born alive, you know, babies. I made yes,
you know, there's definitely some maturing that happens. But overall, babies don't look that
different from adult humans, right? You still have one head to arms, two legs, right? At the basics,
yeah. Right. But then you think about other organisms, right? Like think about, say, uh, uh,
butterflies, right? So you've got, they start off as eggs, they turn into caterpillars, and then
they go through this complete metamorphosis where they disintegrate and then reform as a
butterfly, right? Like that's super cool. It's just amazing. Yeah. Yeah. So the gymnos brand G
Russ are kind of in that more interesting complex life cycle. All right. Now these guys require,
both junipers, and then um, somebody in the apple family to complete their life cycle. So they
start off in with junipers, right? And what they do is they kind of form this really bright orange
gelatinous mass, right? I mean, it's like an orange jelly that forms on junipers, right? And then
later, and that's going to be earlier in the seat in the, in the growing season. And then
now here's the thing for the these gymnos brand G Russs to complete their life cycle. There needs
to be somebody in the apple family nearby. Otherwise, they are eternally preteens. They don't get
to complete their life cycle. But if there is a member of the apple family nearby, they'll infect
the apple leaves. And the apple leaves will get these like little tiny spots that will slowly
turn more orange or uh, basically, yeah, a bright orange-ish color, literally the color of rust.
I feel like I've seen that before. Yeah. Yeah. Well, if you've seen it before, then there's
got to be a juniper nearby for it to complete its life cycle. So it won't um, you know, if there's
just apples, they won't, they won't complete their life cycle. So how do we deal with this? Well,
good news is it's pretty much just a cosmetic disease. I've got an apple at home that gets it
every year. It doesn't seem like it's bothering my apple tree at all. Um, and I live in, uh, I live
close to campus and Steven's point where the houses are all on top of each other. So I'm sure
there's a juniper nearby. Um, but if I didn't want to, you know, for whatever reason, just
absolutely did not want to deal with this anymore on my apple trees, what I'd need to do is remove
all the juniper's nearby or vice versa. Um, what you can do to reduce the infection from one
year to the next is again, that fall clean up. So I've gotten out there to raking up all the
apple leaves. And as far as on your juniper's, prune them out. You're going to go about four to
six inches below where that little gall mass formed and prune that and make sure in between each
pruning, you're cleaning it with a little bit of, um, uh, rubbing alcohol. Okay. All right. Fascinating,
though. Like I, you've, you've done it again, where this is something that two o'clock in the
morning are going to be on a rabbit hole. Just interesting. Like, I don't think I've heard a one
like that. And it's, uh, it also, like I said, you know, we, I think now I'm not alone. We've seen
this before. Uh, so just kind of having the, the understanding of what that is that I've seen
for so many years. And now I understand it a little better. Uh, certainly the, uh, the knowledge of
this stuff is so helpful to the community and two people in their everyday life, especially
this time of year. But it's also just fascinating. It's also just kind of interesting. Even if these
things hopefully never affect any of your plant life or anything like that, I think it's just kind
of cool to know. Oh, yeah. Interesting. In general, one of the things about gardening is,
is it forces you to slow down and focus, right? And I mean, that's where it becomes a mindfulness
tool. And just like knowing that, you know, um, you see these spots on an apple tree or a crab apple
tree and you know, oh, this is, you know, like it takes two different organisms and it slows you
down and forces you to think about it. Same thing with like tar spot on maple trees, you know,
when you, once you finally realize or you notice it, you won't be able to help, but notice it
all over the place. We wanted to touch on some other ones. And one of the ones, especially right now,
is a great, uh, I think one to hit on winter injury and winter burn. Yeah. Yeah. So what happens here,
and this is really your conifers, your evergreens that get this. And what happens is, um, we
probably had a beautiful, uh, fall the year before where it was nice and dry and sunny and beautiful
and warm, um, and maybe even unseasonably warm or unseasonably late. And so the ground,
there wasn't nice and saturated with moisture going into winter. And when as the, uh, the tree
made its way through wintertime, um, the westerly winds just basically pulled the moisture right
out of the plant. And oftentimes we won't notice this winter burn happened until spring,
when the plant breaks dormancy. And that's when all of a sudden, the effect of the winter burn
becomes noticeable. So you could have been that this has been happening all winter long,
but the browning effect doesn't happen until the plant basically wakes up again. So, um,
you know, what he, what can you do about it? Yeah. Um, you know, the best thing is going to be,
there's not really anything you can do to fix it. This is more of a, you know, but next time we have
a beautiful fall, really be thinking about, ooh, I need to be watering my plants. I need to be
watering and making sure everything gets at least an inch of water, at least until the ground
freezes. This time of year, one of the things that I think a lot of us are here, especially if you're
watching the daily news or anything and the weather report and the weatherman will usually tell you,
okay, you want to bring your plants in or you know, you can leave them out or something like that,
and Bill do comes up and that is another topic too, that, uh, well, we've heard this word in this
term a lot. I don't know, understanding what it actually is, I think, would go a long ways.
So if you have ever grown, um, vining vegetables, cucumbers, squash, melons, um, or as far as like,
lilacs go or even, um, bee balm or flocks, all of those are kind of who I think of as the
usual suspects. Um, and if you've ever grown any of them and you've noticed that they get kind of a
white film like somebody sprinkled baby powder or cornstarch on the leaves, that's powdery mill do,
right? And again, um, you know, kind of actually, I was about to say not only cosmetic, but that's not
true. It's really cosmetic to your trees and shrubs, even your, um, your, uh, your perennials,
your flocks and your bee balm, it's not going to kill them in a single year, uh, but your annual
vegetables that definitely can do some damage. It could, uh, pretty much wipe out your yield.
So for those guys, you, uh, probably a little bit more serious than it is for the perennial
and woody plants. Um, so what can we do about it? Well, with those vegetables, well, with everybody,
it really comes down to just being aware that powdery mill do does best in really humid and dry
environments. So anything that you can do to increase the airflow is going to be helpful.
Um, uh, so proper plant spacing, if we're talking about perennials and your bee balm, you know,
because a bee balm can tend to be pretty thick. If your bee balm is getting, uh, getting pretty
thick, go ahead and, and thin them out, you know, every few years. If we're talking about your
vining vegetables, give them the proper spacing. Don't try to squeeze in extra cucumber plants
together. You know, if you think that's going to increase your yield, it's not because you're
going to end up with less yield because you're going to have more disease, right? So properly
space your plants. Um, and those vining vegetables, if you can, get them up off the ground, give
them some sort of supports that way they can grow upwards. Um, and then, you know, for everything,
choosing, um, uh, resistant varieties for everybody that I have talked about the vining vegetables,
the, um, lilacs and the flocks and the bee balms, there are, uh, powdery mill do resistant varieties.
Hmm, hmm, that's a incredible information. As always, you know, thank you for that.
You know, as we're wrapping up you in an event, we wanted to touch on.
Yes. So I'm super excited this weekend is the Wood County Master Gardener Spring Plant
sale. So if you're familiar with the Port Edwards Village rummage sale, um,
you're going to be able to find them right over there. They're going to be, so that's coming up
this Saturday, May 17th, um, uh, from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. The, the plant sale is going to be at 930
Westport Drive. Um, and they are going to have a little bit of everything. They've got some
vegetable starter plants. They've got your annual flowers. Um, and they've got, for new this year,
some herb starter plants. Of course, you've got your, uh, perennials, uh, succulents, tender bulbs.
They've even got some house plants ready for you and they've got some saved seed from last year
for perennials as well as, as a big sale. Um, you also have an opportunity. If you've got any questions
and any questions that you've been wondering of as far as gardening goes, they will have an
ask a master Gardener booth set up. Um, and they will also have the Garden Walk tickets, um,
on sale too. The Garden Walk is going to be July 19th, um, from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. So you can catch
them there and ask them questions about the Garden Walk too. Again, that's the Saturday, May 17th.
They're going to be at 930 Westport Drive. Do people need to register for this event? Oh, no. No,
it's, uh, it's just part of the, yeah, part of the Port Edwards Village rummage sale.
Appreciate that. And as always, appreciate the time, Janelle. Look forward to hanging out again
real soon. That's going to be fun. Uh, we'll talk to you soon and thanks again for joining us.
Absolutely. Thanks for having me. Reach out to Janelle and find out more of
going to their website, extension.wisk.edu, extension.wisk.edu. And thank you so much for joining
the conversation. Everybody here at WFHR's Rapids Report.
