Can you over treat crown rot?

[Hammer]

I have a potted palm that is suffering from some significant crown rot. I have treated with H2O2 as well as daconil.

I have treated the palm every week or two since I noticed the rot. The palm stalled for a while but started to push the dead material out of the growth point. I saw some green but that appears to be fading and the growth has slowed again...perhaps a function of cooler fall temps.

Is it possible that I am over treating and need to let the palm fight it out? Or do I need to keep up the treatments?

Any advice would be appreciated.

[MattyB]

In my opinion you cannot over treat using hydrogen peroxide. I'm not sure if daconil can be toxic if used too much in the crown, but I have killed small seedlings withtoo strong of a daconil mix.

[Hammer]

Thanks Matt. I'll double down on the H2O2.

[Moose]

http://www.palmtalk.org/forum/index.php?/user/848-paul-the-palm-doctor/

[MattyB]

Hey, where is Paul, the palm doctor? We haven't heard from him in a long time.

[Moose]

Hey, where is Paul, the palm doctor? We haven't heard from him in a long time.

http://thewisegardener.boardhost.com/index.php

[Jim in Los Altos]

H202 seems harmless to the palm but pretty reliably deadly to fungus infection.

[kahili]

Hammer, when you say crown rot-are you talking about pythium or rhizoctonia? Both are called crown rot-but Daconil is only used on rhizontonia, it is a waste of fungicide to use it on pythium. Pythium is a water mold,and thrives on moisture, so if it is pythium, you really don't want to keep up with pouring liquid on it constantly.You need a systemic for pythium. So its important to know what you have before you can treat it effectively. Even rhizoctonia needs to dry out-but both will spread so you need to isolate the palm.

[Hammer]

Hammer, when you say crown rot-are you talking about pythium or rhizoctonia? Both are called crown rot-but Daconil is only used on rhizontonia, it is a waste of fungicide to use it on pythium. Pythium is a water mold,and thrives on moisture, so if it is pythium, you really don't want to keep up with pouring liquid on it constantly.You need a systemic for pythium. So its important to know what you have before you can treat it effectively. Even rhizoctonia needs to dry out-but both will spread so you need to isolate the palm.

I'm not sure exactly what I have or how to tell the difference.

The dead tissue is dark brown to black. It seemed to be mostly dried last night. Until I poured peroxide on it. Maybe I'll take a hair dryer on low to it and really make sure it's dry.

Fwiw, the rot was my fault. I got water in the crown several months ago. Been fighting this battle ever since.

[Turtile]

Do what ever you can to keep the growing point dry. Fungi/water moulds can't survive without water! Another fungicide that works well with on both are strobin based.

[MattyB]

Cut its head off

[Hammer]

Cut its head off

I'm gonna mark a "leaf" and if it doesn't move I may do just that.

Having said that I remember doing that earlier this summer. Barely any movement. Once I used the daconil it pushed a lot more a lot faster. But again some dead some green. Hard to tell if the rot is still happening or if it is just leftover rot being pushed out.

[Hammer]

Here's a sideways photo for reference. I just did some minor surgery and cleaned out the crown a little better, used a hair dryer to be sure it's dry and marked the spear.

[MattyB]

Cut everything off at about the yellow "cut" line. If it's nice and tight and white and you don't see any holes or brown rotten spots, then treat with hydrogen peroxide.

[Jeff Searle]

You can't ask if you have some Pythium or Rhizoctonia in the crown. There's no way of knowing. Leaf tissue and soil samples would have to be collected and tested in a lab. If you want, get some Phyton 27 and use. It's listed as fair-good for both of the above mention diseases. It's an excellent fungicide to use. But again, not knowing exactly what you have, it can become a guessing game and get expensive. AND.....you might drench your palm and still loose it, there's no guarantee.

[MKIVRYAN]

I was wondering as well if there is such thing a thing as too much of a good thing when it comes to hydrogen peroxide. I use it on all my palm every two weeks wether they are showing any negative signs or not.

[MattyB]

nope, it's perfectly safe. Not sure why you'd want to add water into the crown if there's no problem, but the hydrogen peroxide can be used on the plants as much as you want with no ill effects. Uhhhh, I guess I should qualify and say that if you're watering your plants with hydrogen peroxide you're probably killing all the beneficial microbes in the soil, but as far as it burning or hurting the leaves or something like that, it's not a problem.

[jfrye01@live.com]

Like others have said, I don't think you can over apply the peroxide. Copper is a different story. I made the mistake of using copper on my butia last spring (stupid newbie mistake, I know now that they hate copper), nearly killed the thing. It just started pushing new growth about a month ago. Doubtful it will make it through this winter...live and learn. Good luck with your palm(s)!

Here's to a mild winter for us all!

[Capnrey]

I just lost two Shade Kentia *Howea Forsteriana* stock/canes to rot. Have no idea why. I just bought it less than two months ago, and it's planted in a planter pot next to the pool - drainage is excellent and I don't over water it .Anyway . The first stock I lost was several weeks ago - I noticed the fronds turning brown and then I saw the base of the trunk had a big black spot on it - so I tugged and bent and the damn thing just snapped in mushy way.

Two weeks later another stock bit the dust - that was this week. White fuzzy fungus, mush was at the base. There are four more stocks and I'm watching them every day now. So far it all seems fine. No black spots, all leaves are green, trunks are solid.

I'm also seeing traces of pink rot in my euturpe and my C. Macrocarpa. I'm using the Hydrogen Perooxide to keep it at bay.

I gotta tell ya . . keeping these palms healthy is no easy task. My neighbor probably thinks I'm nuts everytime he see's me out there every day looking at every single palm in my back yard frond by frond , trunk by trunk. Sometimes I think I'm nuts. :/ They're freakin palm trees - don't they just grow??

IN any case , today I went out and bought two bottles of H 2 O 2 and a sprayer bottle of H 2 O 2. I have the Daconil also . . but I like the idea of something more organic I suppose - if it does the job.

[kahili]

"You can't ask if you have some Pythium or Rhizoctonia in the crown. There's no way of knowing. Leaf tissue and soil samples would have to be collected and tested in a lab." Jeff-I can't believe that you just wrote that! lol There is a way of knowing-as you said yourself. Testing for a disease in a plant is not hard nor expensive if you live near a plant lab, which most universities (esp state univ.) have. They are usually called plant clinics etc. I know here in raleigh I can get a sample tested for $ 10 and get the results in a few days. It is always better to know what you are treating than to use fungicides that will not be effective (and may make the problem worse). Copper sulfate fungicides such as Phyton 27 is a poor choice for either pythium or rhizoc. You say its listed as fair to good-but that is on the label-from the company. You look at any tests from universities on it, and they say it sucks for either once the plant is infected. I wouldn't even waste my money on it if its pythium ( I would throw the plant away if its pythium or keep it as dry as possible and keep it far away from any other plants) . Everyone keeps on talking about Daconil , but it is very limited in what it will treat-usually leaf spot is about its range. It is effective in some other fungi , but not what palms are susceptible to.

[MKIVRYAN]

Matty. I have found that the majority of my palms seem to sizzle at least a small amount when treated. So I thought if there were no downside to treating why not just hit everyone. I'm still new at this and tend not to notice the signs of an unhappy palm so better to just hit them all than be surprised by an unhappy palm and it be too late.

[MattyB]

As you probably know, the hydrogen peroxide is going to "sizzle" whenever it hits any bacteria, but there's bacteria everywhere, most of which is completely harmless. So, just because it's sizzling doesn't mean that your palm is sick. BTW, I don't think the hydrogen peroxide is going to be effective against the pink rot because it's so powdery that it's hydrophobic. Pink rot is everywhere. Just don't rip any leaf bases off your plants and keep the plants happy and healthy and they'll just live with it and be fine.

[Jeff Searle]

Kahili,

I'm confused....if you read above, I stated there's no way of knowing what disease you have for sure UNLESS a sample is tested in a lab. I thought that was pretty clear when I typed it out, maybe not. And the information I wrote about , came off of a chart I have ( almost 20 years old ), that has 30 listed fungicide chemicals. A few include, Chipco26019, Cleary 3336, Subdue, Medallion, Heritage.

[kahili]

Jeff, if you go back and read what you wrote, you said- "You can't ask if you have some Pythium or Rhizoctonia in the crown." So I assume it means what it says-you can't ask. Next sentence...." There's no way of knowing." There is no "unless" in there anywhere. Just-there is no way of knowing. then you go on to say that you could know-but only if you take samples to a lab-which I agree with, but you make that sound like going to the moon! (maybe not that hard-but certainly it seemed that way from how you wrote the whole paragraph-"can't ask", "no way of knowing" etc ) but that could be easily done if you live near a lab-either in a state university or most states have labs that do this as well. As a grower-I would have thought you would have advised that over just throwing a fungicide at the problem (if there even is a problem-looking at the pictures of the palm-I don't think it has crown rot, that it just needs to be left alone and I think it will start to throw out normal leaves). And as for going off a chart that is 20 yrs old-chemicals in general and fungicides in particular have changed a lot in just the past 5-10 yrs!

[MKIVRYAN]

I actually was not aware of that Matty. Thank you. Makes me feel a bit better that I'm not doing quite as bad as I thought.

[Hammer]

nope, it's perfectly safe. Not sure why you'd want to add water into the crown if there no problem, but the hydrogen peroxide can be used on the plants as much as you want with no ill effects. Uhhhh, I guess I should qualify and say that if you're watering your plants with hydrogen peroxide you're probably killing all the beneficial microbes in the soil, but as far as it burning or hurting the leaves or something like that, it's not a problem.

Checking back in on this... H2O2 is an unstable compound. It decomposes into water and oxygen. Application of the compound will kill most of the nasties in the crown. Hoooowwwwwever, wouldn't constant usage create an environment in the crown that is wet all the time? And wet with water not pure HP. Eventually wouldn't that wet crown, however sterile it is relatively speaking, pose a potential problem?

[_Keith]

Short answer is you can overdo anything, especially fungicides and if you try hard enough, even h2o2

[Jeff Searle]

Ok....you now have written for which you lost me.

I stated, A)....you can't just ask if someone has these above diseases in a palm. Leaf and soil samples have to be looked at in a lab. And yes, taking a leaf sample to a lab OR having a company come out and do it for you would not be something the average person is going to do. Most people do not even know this can be done. Just because you know it's available, don't assume everyone knows this, because probably 2/3 of people have no clue. This is a fact. And ....I stand by many chemicals that are still used on the market today. Some of the above chemicals I mentioned I have not used before but were listed on the chart for certain fungicide control. I'm not a chemist, and maybe you are, or have a background in this sort of field, but I'm just a poor, humble nurseryman. Maybe were talking of mostly the same thing, just in two different directions (?).

[Jimhardy]

Keep it dry and leave it alone....

a moving spear gathers no moss