Subject: plant-fungal interactions

From: [email-masked]
Date: Tue, 19 Sep 1995 02:19:46 GMT

A friend told me that she had lost her entire garden (in peak
condition with ripe tomatoes, flowers, etc) suddenly in August at
about the same time she had an explosion of mushroom emergence.

She thinks that the mushrooms did her garden in.  Another friend of
hers suggested something in the soil...perhaps a fungal pathogen.
Now, I have always been fond of fungi in the garden thinking of the
wonderful ways in which it helps to maintain soil mositure, texture
and nutrient availibility.  

We're in North-East Kansas in the tallgrass prairie area.  I imagine
that what she saw was a basidiomycete.   Any ideas of what may have
happened?

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From: Bill Knighton/Susan Hogarth <[email-masked]>
Date: 20 Sep 1995 10:32:57 GMT

>about the same time she had an explosion of mushroom emergence.

The university has a wonderful Plant Disease Diagnostic Laboratory on the fourth floor of 
Throckmorton Hall. She should take some samples of *entire* plants, with soil, there. They can 
give you some idea if the problem was a disease or a cultural problem, and some advide about 
control, etc.

I'm no expert (ha!) but I'd be suspicious of chemical damage if lots of different *kinds* of 
plants died, *all at once*. That really doesn't fit the mode of operation of many pathogens...

Have the plants checked out by someone who 1) can *see* them, and 2) knows what they're talking 
about :-)

-- 

Susan Hogarth
Thank you for not breeding

---

From: [email-masked] (Peter Herman)
Date: 20 Sep 1995 13:59:27 GMT

Subject: Re: plant-fungal interactions
Newsgroups: bionet.mycology
References: <[email-masked]>
Distribution: 
X-Newsreader: TIN [version 1.2 PL2]

[email-masked] wrote:
: A friend told me that she had lost her entire garden (in peak
: condition with ripe tomatoes, flowers, etc) suddenly in August at
: about the same time she had an explosion of mushroom emergence.

: She thinks that the mushrooms did her garden in.  Another friend of
: hers suggested something in the soil...perhaps a fungal pathogen.

It is also possible that the same environmental trigger influenced both
fungal emergence and garden death!  I don't think that a single species of
fruiting basidiomycete is a likely cause of death across such a wide host
range of graden plants.  On the other hand, a damp period which would
encourage basidiocarp formation would also make a whole variety of wilt or
root rot fungi as happy as a clam. One or more of these could easily wipe
out a garden in a flash because they can be fast growers and fast killers!

Peter

 --
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R. Peter Herman				email	[email-masked]
Sveriges Lantbruksuniversitet		Phone:	+46 18 67 12 20
Inst. f. Markvetenskap			Fax:	+46 18 67 27 95
S750 07 Uppsala, Sweden		
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