EPIDEMIOLOGICAL STUDIES OF FIRE BLIGHT (ERWINIA AMYLOVORA) IN SPAIN

In Spain, fire blight was first detected in cider apple in 1995 in the Basque country.
Since then, foci were detected in Navarra, Segovia, Huesca, Guadalajara, Lleida, Zaragoza, and Logroño.
All detected foci were eradicated according to official measures.
However, in most cases it was difficult to establish the origin of fire blight introduced in non-epidemic protected areas.
Weather-based fire blight risk maps of the north-east of Spain were made by Geographic Information System (GIS) with data of 5-10 years from 61 weather stations using the Billing’s Revised System (BRS), Billing’s Integrated System (BIS95) and Powell Models.
The maps identified regions of high fire blight risk around the Ebro river valley and Lleida.
A study was performed during 1997-1999 to establish the probability of fire blight introduction with host plant material imported from 41 nurseries of different European countries including France, Italy and Belgium and accompanied with the CEE ZP Phytosanitary Passport.
The work consisted of periodical visual inspections, and quality control analysis of 6000 samples of representative plant material (including symptomless plants) with methods of detection based on enrichment-ELISA-DASI with monoclonal antibodies and PCR with and without enrichment with specific primers, and final confirmation by strain isolation.

VIII International Symposium on Pear

I. Llorente, A. Badosa, P. Vilardell, E. Montesinos

Pyrus communis, CEE ZP Phytosanitary Passport, fire blight, models, GIS

https://doi.org/10.17660/ActaHortic.2002.596.90