Fire blight (Erwinia amylovora)

The causal agent of fire blight is the gram negative bacterium Erwinia amylovora. E. amylovora can be detected in and on plant tissues in short time, even in low amounts, using a specific, quantitative realtime PCR (qPCR) (Weißhaupt et al., 2016; Hinze et al., 2016).

The fire blight pathogen infects a group of rosaceous plants (apple, pear, quince, hawthorn, cotoneaster and others).  Phytosanitary measures (eradication of shoots or uprooting of plants) to reduce the infection pressure in your orchard or in the surrounding are prerequisites for a successful control of the pathogen. 

E. amylovora is often detected on and in plant tissues without visible symptoms. These so called latent infections in shoots, buds of fruit mummies as well as the epiphytic colonization of blossoms indicate a potential risk for your orchard, which could be detected with a respective diagnosis in our laboratory. 

So if you want to know whether the symptoms found on your plant were caused by the bacterium Erwinia amylovora or if the pathogen is present latent or epiphytic in your orchard, just send us a sample (blossoms, shoots, mummified fruit or bark) for analysis with quantitative real time PCR (qPCR).

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