Morphological Diversity of Phomopsis vaccinii Isolates from Cranberry (Vaccinium macrocarpon Ait.) in Latvia

Abstract

Abstract. Phomopsis vaccinii cause a serious disease of blueberry, cranberry and other Vaccinium crops in the North America and Europe as well. Over 1000 species names are described by Phomopsis spp., but their biology and life style are mostly unknown. Identification of P. vaccinii by methods of classical phytopathology is difficult and complicate, because many species are morphologically similar to P. vaccinii, and P. vaccinii itself has diverse patterns of colony morphology. For this investigation P. vaccinii isolates were obtained from five cranberry plantations in different locations of Latvia (Babite, Alsunga, Rucava, Ape and Pargauja municipality) from berries affected by viscid rot at harvest and storage in 2010. Altogether 44 P. vaccinii isolates were cultivated on potato dextrose agar for description of colony morphology. In order to find some relationships between samples, the isolates were arranged in different groups on the basis of mycelium color and structure (zoning), reverse pigmentation, pycnidium formation time, size, location, number and size of conidia. During this study the colonies of P. vaccinii from cranberry in Latvia showed different morphological features in culture and no relationships between growing regions and groups of isolates were found. P. vaccinii is easy to confuse with other Phomopsis species if only classical phytopathological methods are used.

Pathogenicity of Diaporthe spp. on two blueberry cultivars (Vaccinium corymbosum)

“…Diaporthe vaccinii has been found in several countries in Europe, for example Latvia, Lithuania, Poland and the Netherlands (Lombard et al, 2014;Vilka & Volkova, 2015;Michalecka et al, 2017). Currently, the pathogen is only listed as present in Latvia (EPPO Global Database), and has been eradicated from Poland and the Netherlands (EPPO, 2015;NPPO-NL, 2015).…”

Pest risk assessment of Diaporthe vaccinii for the EU territory

“…Approximately 30 subsequent outbreaks were detected (Figure ; original data from Narouei‐Khandan et al., ). Details on past outbreaks are reported in the literature (Wilcox and Falconer, ; Baker, ; Teodorescu et al., ; Guerrero and Godoy, ; Gabler et al., ; Netherlands Plant Protection Service, , 2013, 2015; Kačergius and Jovaišien≐, ; Lombard et al., ; EPPO, , ; Vilka and Volkova, ; Michalecka et al., ).…”

“…For example, V. myrtillus is common in the natural vegetation at high altitudes and in humid environments with a low soil pH at lower elevations throughout the EU and in Eastern Europe. D. vaccinii has been found in native Vaccinium species in low, wet areas in Eastern Europe and Russia (Dokukina, ; Vilka et al., ,b; Kačergius and Jovaišien≐, ; Galynskaya et al., ; Vilka and Volkova, ), and the pathogen could potentially be transported on broken twigs and as conidiospores in waterways. However, no quantitative information is available about this potential pathway and it is not considered in this PRA.…”

“…F. putrefaciens is very common in wild and cultivated Vaccinium bushes in northern Europe (Kačergius et al., ; Vilka et al., ; Strømeng and Stensvand, ), while D. vaccinii has been found only occasionally and temporarily (EFSA, ; Lombard et al., ; EPPO, ; NPPO, ; Vilka and Volkova, ; Michalecka et al., ).…”

“…The pathogen is widely referred to its anamorphic state P. vaccinii , which is currently officially present in Latvia only (EPPO Global Database, https://gd.eppo.int/). Until recently, it was also identified in Lithuania, Poland and the Netherlands (Gabler et al., ; Kačergius and Jovaišien≐, ; NPPO , ; Lombard et al., ; EPPO ; Vilka and Volkova, ; Michalecka et al., ). The pathogen might be also present in Belarus (Galynskaya and Liaguskiy, ) and Russia (Dokukina, ), although proper identification using DNA technology has not been carried out on the D. vaccinii isolates obtained in these countries.…”