Is this fire blight on my pear tree?

I’ve been chopping whole sections of this tree off thinking the brown spots around the nodes are fire blight; I really need to know.

=M=

Here are a couple pictures of my home orchard, “fruit forest”.

=M=

That does appear to be fire blight on the trunk. I just got through pruning out almost 1/4 of one of our pear trees to get rid of fire blight.
Mine was caused by the exceptionally wet spring we had this year (the rains haven't slacked off even now that we should be headed into our drought months, so I'll probably get to deal with more weird for our area issues).

Redhawk

I just got through pruning out almost 1/4 of one of our pear trees to get rid of fire blight.  

Me too...it is bad this year but only on the bartlett pear.  The asian and anjou look fine.
We've cut out half the height and so many branches the poor thing looks pathetic.  It still has about a dozen nice pears though.

Hey thanks for the expertise; I’ll prolly have to top this tree: you can see where it starts.
=M=

Wow, that is pretty bad, but the best way to deal with it is to take it down so there is some non infected bark between the blight and your cut, that way you get it all.
Don't forget to take it far away or bag and take to the land fill, If you burn it close by, it can become airborne and spread.

I have an enclosed 55 gal. drum "furnace" that I get really hot then toss in short pieces of the blight branches, the furnace has a double bend exit pipe with fine mesh stainless steel screens all along (every foot) the double bend area of the pipe.
To try and elaborate, the pipe goes up 3 feet makes a turn down, 2.5 feet of pipe then a turn up, 3 feet then a turn down, 2.5 feet then a turn up. I have screens at both sides of each turn and two on each straight part, these screens burn out after 2 sessions.
The stove pipe has a thermometer installed just before the first turn up and it usually reads in the vicinity of 1800 degrees f. The screens are made from 1/8" mesh stainless steel. You could probably do the same with 1/4 inch hardware cloth doubled and set on the bias for the second piece.

(my furnace is 250 feet from our fenced in yard area so from the fruit trees it is around 400 feet to the furnace.)

Redhawk

If you can, start a compost heap so you can make compost tea to spray all your orchard trees with it, that will help prevent problems in the future by giving them a good bacterial blanket.

I cut it, and now it looks like this...

However, there is a dark ring; does this mean the tree is infected further down?

=M=

I went out to take a picture of what's left of our bartlett and found more blackened leaves.  I haven't noticed any changes in the bark...just leaves and stems turning black, generally from the tip back down the branch. ...and I don't see any blackened wood at the cuts.

I wonder if your fireblight is more advanced or mine is?

Are you getting any blackened leaves at all?

I hope you don't mind if I add a couple pics of what I thought was fire blight.

These bits are minor compared to a couple weeks ago...we keep thinking we're done with it and then the rains begin again.....

Hmmm...
I have never seen blackened leaves; there was something wrong for sure though...
So, I cut it and guess I’ll see how the summer goes; I’ll keep you updated.

=M=

Judith, you tree is in the early stages, not the later stage like Mark's. you should be able to get it in control by only clipping the "branchlets" that have the dead leaves, check the wood at the cut to make sure it hasn't gotten into the heart wood or cambium, if it has you have to go deeper into the pruning.
Do not forget to sterilize your pruning tools after every cut, I use straight bleach in an open container and do a 5 second dip between pruning cuts and then I do a scrub up with bleach once I've finished.

Mark, yes that ring is signifying that the infection goes deeper, I am very sorry to have to tell you that, but I may have a fix since it looks like it is heart wood that is carrying the blight virus.

Make up some dilute (5 parts water to 1 part bleach) bleach solution and apply it by eye dropper directly on the darkened wood, let that soak in and then apply a few more drops.
Be careful to not get it where the wood isn't darkened (or browned) just as a precaution. Do this several times over the next week and observe if the dark color comes back (that means you have to continue the treatment until it goes away) when the ring doesn't come back seal the wound with white Elmer's glue.

Redhawk

Bryant RedHawk wrote:Mark, yes that ring is signifying that the infection goes deeper, I am very sorry to have to tell you that, but I may have a fix since it looks like it is heart wood that is carrying the blight virus.

Make up some dilute (5 parts water to 1 part bleach) bleach solution and apply it by eye dropper directly on the darkened wood, let that soak in and then apply a few more drops.
Be careful to not get it where the wood isn't darkened (or browned) just as a precaution. Do this several times over the next week and observe if the dark color comes back (that means you have to continue the treatment until it goes away) when the ring doesn't come back seal the wound with white Elmer's glue.

Redhawk

Do you have a good recipe for tea to prevent bacterial spot on peaches, and this fire blight on pears?

=M=

Here is a spot on my Duchess d’ Angouleme pear tree; is this fire blight as well?

=M=