The Perils of Agriculture(and their solutions)

Presentation by Richard Hoenisch

The Development of Plant Pathology

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Migration and the movement of humans, plants, and animals

2Image courtesy of Marius Christensen

Plant Importation

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With the Age of Explorationcame a keen interest inBotany. Plants were broughtTo Europe from all over theworld. Botanical gardensand private collectors viedwith each other for the largest and most exotic collections.

In 1865 alone, 460 tons of plants were imported into France,and by the 1890’s, the trade had grown to 2,000 tons. In 1875, 50 tons of vines were imported from the US.

Captain Bligh and Breadfruit

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Alexander von Humboldt

Sir Joseph Banks

Louis de BougainvilleCaptain James Cook

Engelbert Kaempfer

Early Plant Explorers

Asa Gray and Liberty Hyde Bailey

David Fairchild 1869 - 1954

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An American botanist and plant explorer. Fairchild was responsible for the introduction of more than 200,000 exotic plants and varieties of established crops into the United States, including soybeans, mangos, avocados, nectarines, dates, bamboos, and flowering cherries. Certain varieties of wheat, cotton, and rice became especially economically important.

The World Was My Garden (1938)

Gingko biloba

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Meteor 2017 Wikipedia

Kurt Stueber Wikipedia

Engelbert Kaempfer was the doctor with theDutch East India embassy to Japan in 1690.In 1691 he discovered Gingko biloba ina Buddhist monastery in Nagasaki. Hebrought seeds and planted them in thebotanical garden in Utrecht. The originaltree is still there. The species is approx.270 million years old.

Dawn Redwood Metasequoia glyptostroboides

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Discovered in China in Modaoxi, Hubei, in 1943, in a temple courtyard, by Zhan Wang and identified by Wan Chun Cheng

http://arbresvenerables.free.fr

In 1948, the Arnold Arboretum of Harvard sent an expedition to bring back seeds and cuttingsof this “living fossil.” They distributed seeds and cuttings to universities and arboreta.

Plant a Plant – Get a Plant Pest

Photo USDA -ARS

This fungus has plagued wheat crops and the humanpopulations that depend on them for generations — theancient Romans even worshiped Robigus, the god of rust.Each spring they held the Robigalia festival and offeredsacrifice of a red dog so that he might spare their wheatthat year.

Wheat rust is not a new phenomenon. A rust epidemic in1916 destroyed 100 million bushels in the U.S. andCanada, and the last major North American episode in1954 destroyed 40 percent of the U.S. wheat crop.

Rusts of WheatPuccinia graminis f. sp. tritici

Ergot of Rye Claviceps purpurea Tul. 1853

Photos CPS

Luerssen

Ergotism – or St. Anthony’s Fire, was first mentioned in

857, and occurred sporadically through

the 19th century, when millingpractices were able to

separate out the diseased kernels

Late Blight of Potato 1845Phytophthora infestans (Mont.) de Bary

Photo USDA-ARS

Photo Cornell University

Phytophthora infestans can be traced to a valley inthe highlands of central Mexico. It was first noticedin the US, in Philadelphia, in 1843. It crossed theAtlantic ocean with a shipment of seed potatoesfor Belgium in 1845. Weather conditions in northernEurope were so wet between 1845 -1850 - perfectfor the fungus to flourish on potatoes.

America’s Deadly Gift to Europe

• Powdery Mildew 1847

• Phylloxera 1863

• Downey Mildew 1878

• Black Rot 1885

• In France alone, 6.2 million acres of grapevines were destroyed

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Pier Andrea Saccardo

Anton de BaryRev. M.J. Berkeley Robert Koch Louis Pasteur

The Microbe Hunters

Charles Valentine Riley Louis René Tulasne Pierre-Marie Millardet

Microbe Hunters – The Book

Microbe HuntersBy Paul de Kruif

1926

Colorado Potato Beetle (CPB)Leptinotarsa decemlineata Say, 1824 - Coleoptera

Photo: USDA/Scott BauerPhoto: Richard Casagrande

Photo: W. Crenshaw

The CPB was a North American native beetle living on the east slope of the Rocky Mountains, feeding on a native solanaceous plant, Solanum rostratum. As the settlers advanced westwards, they planted potatoes. The CPB quickly found this a more nutritious hosts, and began to follow potato crops eastward, then made it to Europe in WWI, spreading quickly after WWII

Photo by Jerry Friedman

Buffalo Bur

Colorado Potato Beetle Spread

Map by Fritz Geller-Grimm

Photo: Estonian Institute of Agriculture

The CPB, once it met the potato,began a reproduction frenzy. The female can lay as many as 800 eggsin her lifetime. The eggs are laidin batches of 30 on the undersideof a leaf. The CPB populations wereso immense, that the beetles devastated crops, filled houses and buildings. They reached Germany in 1877, but were eradicated. Then…

Rocky Mountain LocustMelanoplus spretus Walsh 1866

1873 to 1877 - now extinctPhoto by Jim Conrad

Photo courtesy of University Cambridge

The habitat of the species was the high, drylands on the eastern slope of the northern Rocky Mountains. The species occurred at elevations of 2,000 to 10,000 ft. It was unable to survive in low, moist areas for more than one generation. It was once found in greatest abundance in prairie lands with annual rainfall of less than 25 inches. As settlers moved into its rangeduring the western migration, they planted mostly grains. The locusts would swarm outof the Rockies and destroy the crops and anything green. They were destroyed whenfarmers moved into their breeding grounds and destroyed the species by 1902. It is estimated that one swarm in 1874 covered approx. 198,000 square miles!

Rocky Mountain Locust Range

Copyright © 2010 public domain published 1877

Locust is from Latin, locus ustus, meaning "burnt place"

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Yue Jin

Black Stem Rust

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Black Stem Rust• Stem rust fungus is the most feared wheat disease

• Wind born

• Produces 100 billion urediospores per hectare

• Can destroy a crop of wheat in 3 weeks

• Outbreaks of stem rust hit North America in 1905, 1916, and 1953-1955

• Extensive USDA and CIMMYT resistance breeding

• 1999 in Uganda a new race appeared: Ug99

• Spread into Sudan, Ethiopia, Yemen, and Iran

21photos courtesy of the University of Hawaii

Uredospores 1N

Teliospores 1N

Basidiospores 1N(two mating types)to Berberis

Spermogonium(two mating types

Aecium 2N Aeciospores 2N (infects wheat)(sexual recombination)

Life Cycle of Puccinia graminis

Berberis Leaf

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Berberis vulgaris – BarberryAlternate host for Puccinia graminis

Albert Roodink

Wikipedia

Native to Eurasia

Brought to North America as a medicinal and culinary plant

Anton de Bary proved that it as the alternate host for cereal rusts in 1865

Berberis eradication programs in the US, including 2 native species

Includes genera:

Berberis Mahoniax Mahoberberis

over 500 species

Zereshk - Dried fruit of B. vulgaris, a much favored delicacy of Iran

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Berberis vulgaris

Barberry quarantine area of the United States

Barberry distribution in US & Canada

In 1920, the USDA Barberry eradication program began a farm to farm survey covering 750,000 sq miles. By 1933 over 18 million bushes had been destroyed. Canada began its program in the Prairies in 1910.

WY 1990

jaki good

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Uganda 99 Wheat Rust Epidemiology

1999 Uganda2001 Kenya

2003 Ethiopia

2007 Yemen

Cyclone Gonuhit the ArabianPeninsula on June 8, 2007

2008 Iran

IRAN 2008

NematodesAntonie van Leeuwenhoek ( 1632 – 1723) first saw “eel worms”

with his original microscopes, which could magnify up to 275 X

Karl Rudolphi ( 1771 – 1832) and Otto Bütschli( 1848 – 1920) from Germany identified, catalogued, and described the hosts and life cycles of 1000 species. They

are considered the “Fathers of Nematology”

Nathan Cobb (1859 – 1932) studied nematology

at Jena, then worked with the USDA, traveling the world and compiling collections and literature, he

In turn trained Benjamin Chitwood (1907 -

1972), who worked extensively on both plant, animal, and human parasitic nematodes. He studied & developed treatment for Liliaceae bulb nematodes

Nematode Damage

Iowa State UniversitySoybean cyst nematode

Courtesy G.L. Tylk

Iowa State University

Iowa State University

Courtesy R.D. Riggs

Pratylenchus

Photo courtesy of UCD Nematology

Plant Viruses Discovered

Martinus Willem Beijerinck1851 –1931

Wageningen and Delft UniversitiesThe Founder of Virology

Tobacco Mosaic Virus (TMV)called it “contagium vivum fluidum”

TMV

Plant Viruses

Wendell Meredith Stanley 1904 – 1971 UC BerkeleyWith the English crystallographer Rosalind Franklin discovered the structure of plant viruses and the structure of the polio and influenza viruses.

TMV Polio Virus Influenza Virus

Virus Spread and Symptoms

INRA Avignon, France

Lettuce mosaic virus

INRA Avignon, France

Grapevine fanleaf virus

Aphids Whiteflies Mites Nematodes

Scottish Crop Research StationUF/IFAS

Squash Mosaic Virus

Cornell CE

Heredity to the Rescue

Gregor Mendel 1822- 1884demonstrated heritable traits

Hugo de Vries 1848 – 1935Defined the word “gene”

Walter Sutton 1877-1916

Theodor Boveri 1862 – 1915both observed chromosomes

dividing and recombining

Notable Plant BreedersJohn Garton in England – First hybrid grains and vegetables – early 1900sNazareno Strampelli in Italy – high performing hybrid wheat varieties 1900 onwardsLuther Burbank in the US – hybrid fruit and flowers – 1880s – 1920s Norman Borlaug 1950s to 2000s

New Molecular Toolsor

Genetically Modified Organisms (GMO)1973 – first recombinant bacteria – E. coli with a Salmonella gene1978 – E. coli with insulin gene – mass manufacturing of insulin

(Genentech)

Transgenic Plants:Tolerant of glyphosphate (Roundup) corn and soybeansCorn with Bacillus thuringiensis gene ( Monsanto)Resistant to Papaya Ringspot Virus ( Dennis Gonsalves)Golden Rice ( high in vitamin C) - ( IRRI )

John McHugh

The Future

1999 6 billion

2006 6.5 billion

2009 6.8 billion

2011 7 billion

2025 8 billion

2050 9.4 billion

World Population Growth

Science, Education, Teaching, and Agriculture

Solutions?