Kitchen Garden Forum

I have an eleven year old quince - Meeche's Prolific. Five or six years ago it started cropping prolifically. Two years ago it came into leaf late March as usual and flowered well in April and set lots of fruit. Then in the summer all the leaves developed brown spots which rapidly spread to the whole foliage and the fruits stopped growing and shrivelled. Same again last year - no crop for two years.

Has anyone experienced this? Is it quince rust? If so how do I treat it? I am prepared to spray with any appropriate fungicide if it means we can get a crop and start making membrillo again.

Thanks in anticipation of assistance.

Alan

Morning Alan,
I have the same problem with my Quince so as soon the leaves break I drench with Bordeaux Mixture,and again when the leaves open fully.This is on a four year old tree with the problem since planting and the above method stopped the blight/rust last year spreading into a serious infection.

I can only really say "Me too", same problem, same attempt at a solution. Still no quinces though.

I do not listen to Gardeners Question Time as a rule but one I listened to last year I am sure that they said that Quince Rust is inbred in the tree and the best thing was to cull it and buy another variety of Quince and plant well away from the site of the diseased one. Now I am not 100% sure of what I have just written but perhaps they have a website where it can be confirmed or you can have a crack at me for bum information!
JB.

Thanks for your replies. Further searching suggests "quince leaf blight" and recommends spraying with Bordeaux mixture.

Does this work for you, Snooky?

Not a solution, just a suggestion: plants tend to succumb to diseases if they are weakened in some way by other factors. Quinces like lots of water (plant them in a puddle, is the old saw), and I noticed with some quinces I looked after years ago they would get into a bad way in a drought year, which made them defoliate. Wet years they were very happy, and prolific. There might be some correlation between rust and certain local climatic conditions. Something to look into, anyway. As I say, not actually a solution.

Morning Alan,
Yes.Spraying with the Bordeaux Mixture last year cut down the incidence of Blight to a minimum and I had two good fruits from my tree.Hoping for more this year.

FelixLeiter wrote:Quinces like lots of water (plant them in a puddle, is the old saw)

Very true. My quince was once in a wetish area of the garden, at the bottom next to the rather soggy paddock. Then the developers moved in, dug it 3' lower and drained it to build "executive" homes, whatever that means. Now quince is not so happy.

My quince tree, which is at least 60 years old, began to shed its leaves mid-season about 5 years ago. I pruned it right back to "bare bones", sprayed with tar oil and within two years it was looking healthy and producing lots of pear-sized fruit. But now a lot of the fruit is again going rotten on the branches (but not all), though the tree is not dropping many leaves. I wonder whether a spray of Armillatox might help?
John N