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From pests to pathogens: how healthy is your horticulture?
Financial Times
National Plant Health Week aims to educate people about keeping local plantlife safe from potentially devastating disease
Whisper the words Xylella fastidiosa and the British horticultural industry will break out into a collective sweat. Xylella is a fast-spreading bacterium that has wiped out olive groves in Italy and is attacking swaths of fruit and ornamental plants across western Europe. Its range of more than 650 host plants includes trees such as oak, elm, olive and plane, and a long list of garden favourites including lavender, rosemary, hebe and jasmine. It is not yet in the UK, but it if does sneak in it could be devastating, says Raoul Curtis-Machin, director of horticulture at the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh (RBGE). An outbreak of Xylella fastidiosa “could lead to teams descending on gardens to rip out and burn many different plants in all the gardens within 100m of the outbreak,” he says. “This disease could have a massive impact on the British landscape.”
Global Plant Protection News 
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