Potato diseases: description and treatment, fight against them and photos

Potato is one of the most common crops grown in gardeners' summer cottages. Beginning vegetable growers think that it is enough to plant this plant and forget about it until the harvest. However, without proper care, serious potato diseases can appear, which sometimes lead to the death of the plant.

To cure potato diseases, you need to read the descriptions of some of them and choose the most effective treatment.

Fungal diseases

This type of potato leaf disease is very dangerous as it can spread harmful spores. Due to this, pathogens can be found not only on potatoes, but also on planting material and even inventory.Fungal-type diseases begin to actively develop in conditions of high temperature and too humid air. There are some of the most common fungal diseases that can appear on potatoes.

Light blight

This disease is considered the most dangerous and widespread. After seedlings are infected with late blight, small spots appear on the stems and tops of potatoes. Most often, this potato disease appears during the growing season, when all the bushes begin to bloom. The most common signs of illness include:

brown spots on potato leaves that may darken in the future;
appearance of a small white bloom on the inside of the sheets;
potato tubers begin to gradually become covered with specks of gray.

It is possible to prevent the occurrence of such a potato disease with the help of a set of special measures. They will help not only get rid of the source of the fungus, but also improve the immunity of seedlings. For the prevention of late blight should:

use potash fertilizers periodically;
fertilize plants regularly with solutions made from copper, manganese and bromine;
spray the potato stalks once a week with a weak solution of copper sulfate.

If the above measures did not help prevent the onset of potato disease, then you will have to deal with its treatment. You can treat potato bushes using the following tools:

Bordeaux liquid. To combat the disease, it is recommended to use a 1% concentration of the solution. To prepare a liquid, you need to mix the same amount of quicklime and blue vitriol.To treat dark spots, it is necessary to treat seedlings every 10 days.
Oxychom. This chemical solution will help to quickly cope with late blight. To create a working solution, ten liters of water must be mixed with 50 grams of the substance. It is necessary to process the bushes with the resulting liquid twice a week.

Scab

Another potato disease that gardeners often encounter is black scab. It is quite difficult not to notice this disease, as it has pronounced signs. Almost immediately after infection of plants, black spots form on their tubers. A feature of black scab is that it harms tubers selected for planting.

Dark spots appear at low air temperature and high humidity. That is why black scab is actively developing in the first half of spring. Due to the scab, the tubers grow more slowly and sores gradually appear on them.If you do not take any measures, then over time they rot. At the same time, not only the planted tubers rot, but also the root system of young bushes.

Protecting seedlings from this potato tuber disease is not so easy. To do this, you will have to periodically change the place for planting the plant. Also, to prevent the appearance of black scab, it is necessary to properly plant the tubers. Planting should be done only after the soil has warmed up. Harvesting also needs to be done on sunny days so that there is no high humidity.

Some do not know what to do if there are already small dark spots. In this case, you will have to use the following tools:

Boric acid. For spraying bushes, a weak 1% solution should be used. Seedlings should be processed twice a month.
Ditan M-45. The drug is intended for the treatment of tubers before planting. During the preparation of the mixture, add 300 grams of the substance to a bucket of water. Then the tubers are soaked for about 10 minutes in the prepared liquid.

Dry rot

In the eastern and southern parts of the country, a disease such as dry potato rot is common. If nothing is done to treat it, then half of the crop may die because of this. The disease begins to develop after the appearance of a fungus on the tubers, which is originally located in the ground. The disease begins to spread from below and gradually moves upward. First, the root crop rots at the base, and then the rot appears on the upper part of the seedlings. The disease can appear at any stage of potato growth, but rot most often develops during the growing season.

The most common signs of rot include:

gradual withering of the upper part of the bushes;
darkening of the lower half of the stem;
in conditions of high humidity, a bloom with an orange tint forms on the bushes;
veins of the plant begin to appear on the stems.

Sometimes, small grayish spots appear on the surface of potato leaves with dry rot. At the last stages of the development of the disease, cavities form in the tubers, where the mycelium is located.

It is impossible to completely cure bushes from dry rot, and therefore it is better to think in advance about their protection from this disease. As a preventive measure, it is recommended to spray all tubers with Fitosporin before planting. They can also be soaked in a solution prepared from Maxim KS. This will help stop the spread of the disease.

Fusariosis

Fusariosis is one of the most rapidly developing diseases.Fusarium wilt of potatoes can lead to the complete death of the bushes five days after the onset of the disease. First, the fungus begins to damage the root system and eventually appears on the stems. When a potato is sick with Fusarium, its leaves begin to curl and turn yellow. After a few days, they completely dry out and fall off. In parallel, black dots appear on the stems, which indicate the spread of rot.

It is impossible to completely get rid of Fusarium and therefore everything must be done to protect plants from it. To do this, you should carry out the gardening of potatoes, during which the tubers must be kept in the light for about 15 days. They can also be treated with boric acid or copper sulfate.

Verticillosis

Quite often during the growing season, potatoes develop verticillium wilt. Distinguishing wilt from other diseases is quite simple.After infection, some segments of the leaves from below begin to gradually turn yellow. Over time, their surface becomes covered with light spots. In summer, due to verticillium, a pinkish coating may appear on the leaves. Within a week, the potato stalks cover dark small spots, and the plant begins to dry gradually.

To prevent verticillium wilt, you need to feed the plants with potassium and phosphorus. Also, experienced gardeners recommend periodically fertilizing the soil with wood ash to increase the immunity of seedlings.

Anthracnose

Potato anthracnose is a serious fungal disease that quickly spreads to neighboring plants. This is facilitated by rain, wind and even insects. Most often, bushes that previously suffered from mechanical damage suffer from anthracnose. The main sources of the disease are the remains of infected seedlings and infected seeds.

Ways to deal with the disease are very simple. Since it is impossible to cure an already infected plant, you will have to take care of protecting he althy bushes. To do this, you need to get rid of all seedlings with anthracnose so that it does not move to neighboring bushes. Then the whole potato is sprayed with a copper solution made from 10 liters of water and 50 grams of the substance.

Viral diseases

Viral potato diseases are more common than fungal ones. After the appearance of such diseases, the tops begin to deform and change their color. Also, the appearance of viral diseases of potatoes significantly slows down the growth of grown seedlings. Diseases of this type are dangerous because they do not manifest themselves in the initial stages of development. To protect potatoes from viral infections, you need to familiarize yourself with the most famous of them in advance.

Striped mosaic

Plants with banded stem mosaic can be easily distinguished from he althy bushes. Small brown spots or streaks can be seen on leaves of infected seedlings. Also, such stripes appear on the sheets from the back. Because of this, the leaves become brittle and quickly fall off. At the last stage of development of the banded mosaic, dark rings can be seen gradually appearing on the tubers.

The appearance of this disease can cause aphids and therefore it is necessary to protect plants from these pests. For protection, you can use a soap solution, which is prepared from 10 liters of water and 250 grams of laundry soap.

Twisting

Potatoes with twisted leaves must be treated so that they do not die. The main reason why this disease appears is the virus in the planting material.Sometimes leaf curl is caused by pests such as bed bugs or aphids. The disease spreads rapidly at high temperatures of the earth and air. Also, its development can be accelerated in the absence of watering during periods of drying out of the soil. If no measures are taken to combat the problem, then some of the bushes may rot and because of this, the yield will seriously deteriorate.

Before you deal with rotten and twisted leaves, you need to familiarize yourself with the main signs of the manifestation of the disease. These include:

white bloom on most top sheets;
twisting of the lower leaves at the initial stage of the development of the disease and the gradual deformation of the leaves from above;
tops begin to turn yellow, and its backside is covered with a bloom with a pink tint;
The leaf plate becomes more brittle and breaks even with the slightest contact.

Plants become infected by twisting rather slowly. Sometimes this process drags on for several months. If potato bushes have become infected with this infection, then they will not be cured. The only thing that can be done with them is to completely remove them from the site and burn them.

Phytoplasmosis

Phytoplasmosis or stolbur often affects vegetable crops such as eggplant, potatoes, tomatoes and peppers. After the appearance of potato stolbur, the growth of bushes slows down several times, their leaves become smaller and gradually dry. Over time, dots of black gray appear on the leaves. Two weeks after infection, a lot of anthocyanin accumulates in the leaves and because of this they turn purple. In the pictures of plants with phytoplasmosis, you can see all these changes.

To get rid of phytoplasmosis, many recommend immediately burning all infected plants.However, before that, you should try to cure them with a solution prepared from karbofos. To create it, you need to mix 40 grams of the substance in a ten-liter container with water. Spray the bushes twice a week.

Gothic

Gothic tuber, like many other diseases caused by a viral infection, is accompanied by leaf deformation and rotting root crops. Infected potato tubers gradually elongate and become cylindrical in shape. The main carriers of such an infection are grasshoppers, the Colorado potato beetle and bedbugs.

Gothic appears at all stages of plant development. Over time, it spreads from the tubers to the rest of the bushes. The following signs appear on the seedlings:

tops turn yellowish after flowering;
the number of eyes on potato tubers is rapidly increasing;
infected plants have practically no inflorescences;
in summer, roots become speckled and start to crack.

To prevent the occurrence of this disease, you must:

water plants regularly during root formation;
periodically treat bushes with insecticides;
before planting, make sure that the seed is not infected with viral infections.

Conclusion

Quite often, viral or fungal diseases begin to appear on potatoes. The fight against them is of interest to many gardeners who have recently begun to grow potatoes. To quickly get rid of various diseases, you should study their description and methods of their treatment in more detail.