Plant Diseases

 There are more than 80,000 plant diseases known worldwide. In fact, all plants are vulnerable to attack by disease. Crop plants are frequent victims, and crop diseases can result in enormous agricultural and economic losses.

Some plant diseases can actually be beneficial in natural ecosystems because they balance the growth of plant populations. Though epidemics may occur in nature, they are rare because the diversity of wild plants slows the spread of most plant disease. Crops are grown as single species in large numbers and diseases can spread easily under these conditions.

Types of Plant Diseases

Plant diseases are classified as noninfectious if they are caused by some environmental factor and are not transmitted from one plant to another. Infectious diseases are those that are caused by a disease organism such as a virus, fungus, or nematode.

Noninfectious diseases

are probably the major causes of poor health in plants and are most frequently the result of adverse environmental conditions. Low concentrations of soil minerals such as nitrogen, phosphorus, or iron can result in abnormal plant growth. Symptoms of such nutrient deficiencies often include yellow or abnormally formed leaves and slow plant growth. Another frequent cause of poor plant health is too much water, which results in low amounts of oxygen in the soil and poor root growth. Plants may also become diseased if soil acidity is too low or too high.

Plants are also damaged by toxic chemicals. For example, pesticides applied to crops may have adverse effects on plant growth. Poor health in plants may result from pollutants in the air. Ozone (O3) is released into the air in large quantities by automobiles and factories. This chemical has been shown to damage the growth of a number of major forest trees. Sulfur dioxide and nitrous oxide are also added to the air by auto exhaust and smoke. These chemicals dissolve in rain water and make it acidic. In many parts of the world this acid rain causes crop plants and forest trees to become diseased and sometimes die. (See also Acid Rain; Pollution, Environmental.)

Physical injury—as from lightning, ice storms, machinery, or animals and insects that eat foliage and stems—adversely affects plant growth. In many cases, however, physical injury does not kill plants directly, but it creates wounds through which infectious diseases can enter the plants.

Infectious diseases.

Viruses are common agents of infectious diseases in plants. When a virus enters a plant cell, it causes the cell to produce more viruses and often causes the death of the cell. The symptoms of viral disease vary. They often include leaf mottling or changes in leaf color, malformation of stems and leaves, dead spots, or stunted growth. Perhaps the best-understood plant virus is the tobacco mosaic virus. This virus infects tobacco, potato, pepper, and eggplants. Because it is a very simple virus, it has been intensively studied by scientists. (See also Virus.)

Mycoplasmas and bacteria infect a wide variety of crop plants. These tiny, single-celled organisms may damage the host plant by releasing toxic chemicals, or they may directly digest plant tissue. These disease agents are often transmitted by the wind, but they may also be carried by insects or on farm machinery. They usually enter the plant through wounds. Perhaps the best-known bacterial disease is crown gall, caused by the bacterium Agrobacterium tumefaciens. This bacterium produces distinctive growths at the base of the plant's stems and may infect members of more than 40 families of plants. (See also Bacteria.)

Seventy-five percent of the diseases in plants are caused by fungi, such as rusts, smuts, and mildews. When fungal spores germinate on a plant, they produce infectious filaments called hyphae. These hyphae invade the plant tissues, absorbing nutrients from plant cells and often causing abnormal growth and cell death. Late blight is a disease caused by a fungus (Phytophthora infestans). The organism attacks potato plants and was responsible for the Irish potato famines of the mid-1800s. The chestnut blight is caused by a fungus (Endothia parasitica) that originally grew naturally on chestnut trees in China. In about 1900 the fungus was introduced into North America on nursery stock and quickly spread to American chestnuts. Within 30 years the disease had killed all chestnut trees in the eastern United States. Dutch elm disease is also caused by a fungus. Rusts and smuts are fungal diseases that attack the stems and flowering stalks of major crops such as corn and wheat. In 1935, for example, the black stem rust (Puccinia graminis) was responsible for the loss of 60 percent of the wheat crop in Minnesota and the Dakotas. (See also Fungus.)

Nematodes, or roundworms, are among the most abundant animals found in soil. Many of these microscopic worms cause plant diseases. They obtain food by sucking the cytoplasm from root cells (see Cell). Plants infected by these animals are often stunted and may show symptoms of water or nutrient deficiency. Nematodes are responsible for root knot and other root diseases. (See also Worm, “Roundworms.”)

Parasitic plants may cause diseases in other plants. Dodder (genus Cuscuta) is a plant that is unable to make its own food. It attacks host plants and obtains food from their cells. Dodder seeds may contaminate the seed stocks of clover, alfalfa, and flax; thus, the parasite is sown with the crop it infests. Witchweed is a small parasitic plant that attaches to the roots of host plants such as corn, sorghum, rice, and sugarcane and interferes with the growth of the plants. The common mistletoe is a parasitic plant that causes abnormal growth in many trees and robs its host of water and minerals. (See also Mistletoe; Parasite.)

Disease Control

Perhaps the simplest approach to disease control is to keep the pathogen, or disease-causing agent, away from susceptible plants. Toward this end, many states have strict rules regarding the import of crop plants and fruits that might carry pathogens.

Once a disease is established, the main approach to its control is eradication. Diseases may be eradicated by crop rotation—that is, a farmer may decide to replace a diseased crop with another species of crop plant. This technique is effective against disease organisms that do not produce spores or cannot survive for long periods of time in the soil. Sometimes a disease can be eradicated by pruning the diseased portion of the plant.

Some diseases can be controlled by growing plants in climates that are unsuitable for the pathogen. Farmers try to avoid inflicting mechanical damage on plants in order to prevent the entry of disease-causing agents. Insecticides may be effective against plant diseases that are spread by insects

Using plant breeding and genetic engineering techniques, scientists have been able to develop strains of plants that are resistant to disease. This process of plant selection must go on continually, because soon after disease-resistant plants are developed, disease organisms evolve the ability to infect them.

Biological control—the use of natural processes to combat pathogens—has become increasingly common. This sort of control may involve introducing the pathogen's natural enemies into its environment. Plant diseases can also be controlled by interplanting, or growing several crop plants together. This sort of planting simulates the conditions in natural ecosystems, where the diversity of plants limits the spread of infectious diseases.