• Fire Blight Update

    Published on June 11, 2025
    In this episode, Dr. George Sundin joined me to talk about management strategies for fire blight especially in light of the recent storms that hit Michigan.

  • Tree Fruit Update with the MSU Extension Fruit Team

    Published on June 20, 2025
    This week, Derek Plotkowski Ph.D. and Jackie Perkins join the podcast to give updates on small fruits and tree fruit in Southeast and West Michigan.

  • Tree Fruit Update with Dr. Nikki Rothwell

    Published on June 8, 2025
    This week, MSU Extension Specialist Dr. Nikki Rothwell, joined me to talk about how the season is progressing for tree fruit here in Michigan.

  • Lesser appleworm

    The adult is a small gray moth with distinct small orange bands or patches on the wings; some blue is also evident in newly emerged specimens.

  • Plum rust mite (Peach silver mite*)

    Adult is minute and wormlike, with two pairs of legs, and pale yellow to brownish yellow in color. The nymph is pale yellowish white and closely resembles the adult.

  • Mullein plant bug

    Adult is grayish green with black spots on the legs. The nymph resembles an apple aphid or a white apple leafhopper and is solitary, very mobile and lacks cornicles.

  • Pear rust mite

    The overwintering stage is a light brown, wedge-shaped adult, which cannot be seen without a 15X hand lens. The summer forms are nearly white in color, and even smaller than the overwintered adults.

  • Comstock mealybug

    Adult females and nymphs are generally similar in appearance, having an elongate-oval shape, no wings, a many-segmented body and well-developed legs.

  • Tufted apple bud moth

    Adult is an inconspicuous moth, varying from mottled gray at the wing base to brown at the wing tip, with a lighter colored margin along the wing's leading edge. Two or three groups of tufted scales can be seen on the top of the wings.

  • Fire blight

    Blossom blight occurs in the spring. Infected blossoms first exhibit a water soaking, followed by wilting and their eventually turning brown on apple and nearly black on pear. Individual flowers or the entire cluster may be affected.

  • Rose chafer

    The rose chafer is a light tan beetle with a darker brown head and long legs. It is about 12 mm long. There is one generation per year.

  • White apple leafhopper

    Adults are creamy white with short antennae, translucent wings, and a long wedge-shaped body. Usually found on the underside of leaves, they jump and fly with great agility. Nymphs are yellowish, wingless and very mobile; they generally move in a back-and-forth motion.

  • Apple union necrosis and decline

    AUND is due to an incompatibility at the graft union where a resistant scion is grafted onto a susceptible, but tolerant rootstock, most commonly MM.106.

  • Humped green fruitworm

    Adult's forewings are gray and marked with light and dark areas for 2/3 of their length the outer 1/3 is a lighter gray.

  • European apple sawfly

    The adult looks similar to a small, orange-brown wasp with the ventral side and legs orange in color. It has transparent wings with many veins. The egg, oval and translucent, is inserted into the receptacle of the flower.

  • Gray mold

    Lesions usually start at the calyx or stem end of the fruit or at wound sites as small water-soaked areas. As lesions age, they enlarge, turning from grayish-brown to light brown, and eventually to a darker brown.

  • White rot

    Fruit lesions become visible 4–6 weeks before harvest, and appear as small, circular, slightly sunken tan to brown spots, sometimes surrounded by a red halo on yellow-skinned fruit.

  • Green Apple Aphid

    Green apple aphid nymphs and adults prefer to feed on the underside of leaves on growing shoot tips and stems.

  • Winter moth

    Adult male has grayish-brown wings; the female has remnants of wings and so cannot fly. This, in combination with the female's large body, makes the legs appear to be long, and gives her the superficial appearance of a spider.

  • Periodical cicada

    Adults are wedge-shaped, nearly black, with red eyes and red-orange wing veins. The clear wings are held tent-like over the body.

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