Several Common Plant Diseases--and How to Tackle Them (1)

Be on the lookout for some of the following signs of disease that may affect the plants in your garden. Below, I have begun a list of several of the most common plant diseases, along with some of the simplest and most effective ways of dealing with each one.

Prevention
There are several preventive actions you can take, even before signs of trouble appear. Using companion planting, rotating crops, watering early in the day or in the late afternoon(while avoiding getting water on the leaves) and keeping plants spaced far enough apart will all help reduce problems with insects as well as fungal and bacterial diseases.

When you start vegetables from seed, check the packet and purchase disease-resistant varieties whenever possible. Keeping a journal or sketchpad handy will also be helpful, since you can record information on the kinds of insects and signs of disease that are present in the garden—and chart alongside this the type of plant as well as the dates the problem occurred. Simply using some common sense practices such as removing diseased sections of the plant, companion planting and changing your planting schedule may have a significant impact and reduce problems in subsequent years.




Damping Off
Very youung seedlings and seeds that have not yet germinated rot or fall over before becoming established. To prevent damping off, make sure you do not overcrowd things when you place the seeds in flats or when you sow seeds directly in rows in the garden. If you use containers to start seeds indoors, make sure that everything has been thoroughly washed out and is free of soil or potting medium that may previously have been used to start seeds. Use vermiculite instead of soil to cover seeds and make sure you do not overwater.

Botrytis Blight
We often get this on the geraniums we keep in large planters on either side of the front steps—although it is present elsewhere in the garden as well. When this blight hits, you may notice the flowers clumping together in a brown or brownish-black mass. Leaves may be anywhere from a dark yellow to brown or black, and shrivelled at the edges. What we have found most effective is to simply remove diseased sections right away, then watch how we are watering—watering early in the day is best. We also try to use a watering can with an elongated spout, so that we can water directly around the plant, and make sure the water is going to soil and then the roots instead of sitting on the leaves, where it is not needed and may encourage diseases such as leaf spot, mildew, and blight.