Epiphytotics
When the number of individuals a disease affects increases dramatically, it is said to have become epidemic (meaning “on or among people”). A more precise term when speaking of plants, however, is epiphytotic (“on plants”); for animals, the corresponding term is epizootic. In contrast, endemic (enphytotic) diseases occur at relatively constant levels in the same area each year and generally cause little concern.
Epiphytotics affect a high percentage of the host plant population, sometimes across a wide area. They may be mild or destructive and local or regional in occurrence. Epiphytotics result from various combinations of factors, including the right combination of climatic conditions. An epiphytotic may occur when a pathogen is introduced into an area in which it had not previously existed. Examples of this condition include the downy mildews (Sclerospora species) and rusts (Puccinia species) of corn in Africa during the 1950s, the introduction of the coffee rust fungus into Brazil in the 1960s, and the entrance of chestnut blight (Endothia parasitica) into the United States shortly after 1900. Also, when new plant varieties are produced by plant breeders without regard for all enphytotic diseases that occur in the same area to some extent each year (but which are normally of minor importance), some of these varieties may prove very susceptible to previously unimportant pathogens. Examples of this situation include the development of oat varieties with Victoria parentage, which, although highly resistant to rusts (Puccinia graminis avenae and P. coronata avenae) and smuts (Ustilago avenae, U. kolleri), proved very susceptible to Helminthosporium blight (H. victoriae), formerly a minor disease of grasses. The destructiveness of this disease resulted in a major shift of oat varieties in the United States in the mid-1940s. Corn (maize) with male-sterile cytoplasm (i.e., plants with tassels that do not extrude anthers or pollen), grown on 60 million acres (24 million hectares) in the United States, was attacked in 1970 by a virulent new race of the southern corn leaf blight fungus (Helminthosporium maydis race T), resulting in a loss of about 700 million bushels of corn. More recently the new Helminthosporium race was widely disseminated and was reported from most continents. Finally, epiphytotics may occur when host plants are cultivated in large acreages where previously little or no land was devoted to that crop.
Epiphytotics may occur in cycles. When a plant disease first appears in a new area, it may grow rapidly to epiphytotic proportions. In time, the disease wanes, and, unless the host species has been completely wiped out, the disease subsides to a low level of incidence and becomes enphytotic. This balance may change dramatically by conditions that favour a renewed epiphytotic. Among such conditions are weather (primarily temperature and moisture), which may be very favourable for multiplication, spread, and infection by the pathogen; introduction of a new and more susceptible host; development of a very aggressive race of the pathogen; and changes in cultural practices that create a more favourable environment for the pathogen.
Environmental factors affecting disease development
Important environmental factors that may affect development of plant diseases and determine whether they become epiphytotic include temperature, relative humidity, soil moisture, soil pH, soil type, and soil fertility.
Temperature
Each pathogen has an optimum temperature for growth. In addition, different growth stages of fungi, such as the production of spores (reproductive units), their germination, and the growth of the mycelium (the filamentous main fungus body), may have slightly different optimum temperatures. Storage temperatures for certain fruits, vegetables, and nursery stock are manipulated to control fungi and bacteria that cause storage decay, provided the temperature does not change the quality of the products. Little, except limited frost protection, can be done to control air temperature in fields, but greenhouse temperatures can be regulated to check disease development.
Knowledge of optimum temperatures, usually combined with optimum moisture conditions, permits forecasting, with a high degree of accuracy, the development of such diseases as blue mold of tobacco (Peronospora tabacina), downy mildews of vine crops (Pseudoperonospora cubensis) and lima beans (Phytophthora phaseoli), late blight of potato and tomato (Phytophthora infestans), leaf spot of sugar beets (Cercospora beticola), and leaf rust of wheat (Puccinia recondita tritici). Effects of temperature may mask symptoms of certain viral and mycoplasmal diseases, however, making them more difficult to detect.
Relative humidity
Relative humidity is very critical in fungal spore germination and the development of storage rots. Rhizopus soft rot of sweet potato (Rhizopus stolonifer) is an example of a storage disease that does not develop if relative humidity is maintained at 85 to 90 percent, even if the storage temperature is optimum for growth of the pathogen. Under these conditions, the sweet potato root produces suberized (corky) tissues that wall off the Rhizopus fungus.
High humidity favours development of the great majority of leaf and fruit diseases caused by fungi, water molds, and bacteria. Moisture is generally needed for spore germination, the multiplication and penetration of bacteria, and the initiation of infection. Germination of powdery mildew spores occurs best at 90 to 95 percent relative humidity. Diseases in greenhouse crops—such as leaf mold of tomato (Cladosporium fulvum) and decay of flowers, leaves, stems, and seedlings of flowering plants, caused by Botrytis species—are controlled by lowering air humidity or by avoiding spraying plants with water.
Soil moisture
High or low soil moisture may be a limiting factor in the development of certain root rot diseases. High soil-moisture levels favour development of destructive water mold fungi, such as species of Aphanomyces, Pythium, and Phytophthora. Excessive watering of houseplants is a common problem. Overwatering, by decreasing oxygen and raising carbon dioxide levels in the soil, makes roots more susceptible to root-rotting organisms.
Diseases such as take-all of cereals (Ophiobolus graminis); charcoal rot of corn, sorghum, and soybean (Macrophomina phaseoli); common scab of potato (Streptomyces scabies); and onion white rot (Sclerotium cepivorum) are most severe under low soil-moisture levels.