cdelei wrote:Thanks John! I was having her spray for powdery mildew originally. It's pretty common in our area on the roses, squash plants, etc. But when I got back and saw the cankers, I had a feeling it was worse than mildew. I think between the two, there was just no way for this tree to recover. I'm keeping a close eye on the other affected tree. Looks like powdery mildew right now, which has gotten better. But I'll look for signs of fire blight since that may very well be coming. Thank goodness nothing else is showing signs (so far).
Just a further thing on mildew control.
Mildew on apples has two stages.
First is primary mildew which is the highly infectious stage and occurs when the flower buds are just opening on the trees. The whole fruit cluster is enveloped in the mildew and the cluster fails to develope properly. It helps control enormously if you can pick these clusters off and burn.
It is from this primary source that spores are left for the secondary mildew to develope. This is the mildew that infects leaves And shoots later in the season.
Again...you can see these infected shoots at pruning time, and should be cut off if possible as they will be a source in the spring for re- infection.
Bad infections of mildew can seriously reduce crop levels as well as damage the trees growth.