If gray rot appears on strawberries, you need to save the crop and know what control methods are available.
Fragrant, sweet, fleshy pulp of this berry will not leave anyone indifferent. Everyone who has even a small piece of land always occupies part of it with a bed of strawberries. At the end of spring - beginning of summer they receive their first harvests. Every year it pleases summer residents with ripe beauties - berries.
But it often happens that the wild flowering of bushes in May, which makes one expect a large harvest, does not live up to expectations and instead of large ripe berries, large, unpleasant to look and feel, rotten fruits covered with a gray coating hang on the bushes. Oh, what disappointment and regret the summer resident receives during his daily berry picking! This is how a very common and quite dangerous strawberry disease behaves - gray rot. In some years it can destroy up to 2/3 of the crop.
The insidiousness of the disease is also that it manifests itself when the time comes to harvest the first harvest or during the ripening of the berries. During this period, it is impossible to use any chemicals against its pathogen. What to do then? How to overcome this disease?
Reasons for appearance
The causative agent of gray rot of strawberries is the fungus Botrytis cinerea. Measures to combat the disease will be effective only when the biology of its development ceases to be a mystery to the gardener.
Therefore, let’s begin our study of ways to combat the disease with exactly what conditions the rot pathogen prefers for its development, where and how it overwinters, and what is the reason for its appearance.
The fungus overwinters on plant debris and in the spring, at optimal temperatures and air humidity, affects all regenerative organs and tissues of the bush. But the disease is practically not noticeable before the berries appear. If you carefully examine the very green berries that are just beginning to ripen, you will notice small dark spots on some of them.
These spots tend to grow and in just a few days will become a source of continuous reproduction of spores, which can easily and quickly be carried by the wind throughout the strawberry bed. Most often, dense, poorly ventilated, low-lying or shaded strawberry plantations are affected, in which, due to poor air circulation, a microclimate favorable for the development of the pathogen is created (optimal not too high temperatures and high humidity, especially with frequent watering or humid summers).
So, from year to year its population grows, which over time leads to the total destruction of the entire berry crop.
Strawberries themselves love open sun and abundant watering, as well as space and sufficient feeding area. The lack of light makes the bushes weak and more susceptible to the pathogen.
Gray rot takes advantage of this. Among other things, aging strawberry bushes are also more susceptible to infection by the pathogen than young ones.
Prevention
Prevention of the disease is perhaps the most effective way to combat gray mold. To obtain a positive result, you must take the following measures:
- Before planting a berry garden bed, it is important not to make a mistake with the location. It should be sunny, located in an open, well-ventilated, not low-lying area.
- In early spring, after the snow has melted, the bed must be thoroughly cleaned of last year's leaves.
- During the ripening period, a good way to improve the ventilation of the berry garden is to mulch the rows with sawdust or straw. At the same time, it will be good if you place it, including under the brushes with berries themselves. It is important that they do not touch the ground. The same function is performed by supports for berries.
- Another way to improve the ventilation of the berry garden is to regularly loosen the rows, especially if the strawberries grow on heavy, poorly structured soils.
- Mulch can be replaced with agrofibre. A very good way to protect the crop not only from the development of weeds, but also from the growth of the strawberries themselves (which leads to stitching of rows and, as a result, disruption of the microclimate on the site).
- Wood ash has always been and remains a good remedy for the prevention of various diseases. Gray rot did not stand aside either.
- Make mixed plantings of strawberries and garlic. Phytoncides and esters of the latter do not allow the pathogen to live and develop in peace in its vicinity. Which is very beneficial for strawberries.
- Every three years you need to completely renew the berry garden. Transfer it to another place, after adding the necessary fertilizers. Treat the mustaches from the same plants or a new variety purchased for the plant with a fungicide a couple of weeks after planting.
- Each time when picking berries, do not throw out infected berries nearby on the ground as unnecessary. They must be collected and destroyed somewhere on the land. It is better to burn with any plant residues.
- Remove strawberry tendrils, weak young plants, old bushes, and leaves from them in a timely manner.
It is worth knowing that breeders have not yet developed strawberry varieties that are absolutely resistant to the disease. But there is still a group of varieties that are more resistant to the pathogen than others. These are Friendship, Zenith, Pocahontas, Ruby Pendant, Muto, Saxon, Koralka, Pavlovskaya Beauty, and others. The disease causes less harm to strawberry varieties with a short ripening period. This is due to the fact that their berries, having fruited, do not have time to become infected.
Treatment of strawberries from gray rot
The chemical method of combating this disease is not as effective as the preventive method.
But still it cannot be ruled out. If a disease is detected on the berries, spraying is not safe for the person himself - it is toxic. In addition, it is absolutely useless, the berry is already spoiled. But spraying the berry plant with a solution of Bordeaux liquid (1 teaspoon per 1 liter of water) immediately after the fruiting period, as well as again in early spring after harvesting the old foliage, gives good results. The following drugs are also effective: Chorus, Strobi, Boxwood, Falcon, etc.
Early spring feeding of the berry garden with mullein infusion (1 part mullein to 10 parts water), solution consumption - 3 liters per linear meter. This feeding has a double effect: nutrition and the fight against gray rot. Additional fertilizing with nitrophoska will also strengthen the plants' immunity. A strong plant is less susceptible to infection. Feeding the berry garden with mullein can be repeated in September.
Before flowering, it is better to treat the berry with the biofungicide Fitosporin.
There are also equally effective folk methods of combating the rot pathogen. For example, a remedy for gray rot prepared on the basis of iodine (5 ml per 5 liters of water) can destroy the causative agent of the disease.
The use of dry pollination of the berry plant with dry mustard is also very effective against the causative agent of the disease. Start doing such treatments in early spring and repeat them once a week until the start of flowering.
The main thing in this difficult task is not to be lazy. The causative agent of gray rot is just waiting for this!
Growing strawberries is not easy, because they are often affected by diseases. Gardeners especially often complain that their strawberries in the garden begin to rot. Why do berries rot and how to correct the situation?
Causes of rotting strawberries
Unripe strawberries are affected by gray rot, and sometimes black “fluff” can be found on ripe picked berries. These types of rot are most often found in strawberry beds. This phenomenon should not be ignored if you expect to get a good harvest of strawberries in the future. The fact is that gray and black rot spores overwinter on plant debris and multiply quickly under favorable conditions.
There are several reasons for the appearance of rot in a strawberry bed - wet weather, dense plantings in a row, poor air ventilation in the rows and the location of the bed in a lowland. Excessive watering of strawberry beds also leads to increased humidity. Active rot on berries begins to spread when the air temperature drops. Rain and wind spread the disease throughout the ridge, and if the summer turns out to be wet, there is no hope for a good harvest of strawberries.
Gray rot
Basically, gray rot forms on ripened berries, enveloping them in a gray coating, very reminiscent of mold. Berries that lie on the soil or are in close proximity to it are especially massively affected.
How to prevent the disease?
First of all, it is necessary to plant strawberry varieties that are resistant to gray rot. When planting, you should not thicken the arrangement of bushes, making sure that there is enough light between the rows and that it is well ventilated. Applying excessive amounts of fertilizer reduces the immunity of strawberries, and they are more quickly affected by gray rot.
In the spring, the rows are mulched with sawdust or chopped straw, which is a natural “antiseptic” for strawberries. You can also fill the row spaces with pine needles and peat. In the spring and after picking berries, the garden bed is treated with copper oxychloride.
It is important that the berries do not come into contact with the ground. During harvest, rotten strawberries should be collected in a separate bucket, and healthy berries should not be touched. The collected rotten berries must be taken outside the site.
Black rot
There are practically no differences between gray and black rot. White mold appears on the berries, which turns gray after a couple of days. The peculiarity is that black rot occurs on the collected berries, therefore it is dangerous during transportation and storage.
How to deal with this disease?
Strawberries should be planted in sunny areas with ventilation. In the spring, before flowering, strawberry plantings need to be fed with manganese, making sure that the feeding is not unnecessary. It is useful to sprinkle the rows of strawberries with wood ash, which inhibits the development of rot in the garden bed.
Since rot spores overwinter in the remains of foliage, old foliage and all weeds are removed from strawberries in the fall. It is useful to shed a solution of manganese (in spring and autumn), thus disinfecting the soil and plants.
Strawberries at a summer cottage are often affected by diseases: leaves turn yellow, mustaches grow, shoots change, strawberries rot. Why do strawberries rot on the bush and what to do to prevent it?
The reasons for rotting strawberries may be improper care, fungal diseases, or the appearance of bacterial ones. How to distinguish between them and determine exactly the reason that influenced the rotting of strawberries?
Reasons why strawberries rot:
- Gray rot;
- Black rot;
- Excess moisture;
Gray rot on a strawberry bush
Unripe strawberries on the bush can be affected by gray rot. You can find black fluff on already ripe berries. The gardener should not ignore such manifestations, even if they were only on a few berries.
Causes of gray rot : gray rot, like black rot, overwinters in the ground. It activates in conditions favorable to itself. In addition, gray rot also persists on the affected residues, so all strawberries removed from the site must be burned away from their planting site. The soil mixture is processed, but it is advisable not to plant anything at the previous planting site for several years.
Where does gray mold appear? : The disease spreads to young and ripe berries. It appears in the form of a gray coating, exactly reminiscent of mold. The top berries on a strawberry bush are not affected as extensively as those that are in contact with the ground or located nearby.
Prevention of gray rot : in order to prevent the appearance of the disease, it is necessary not to thicken the garden beds when planting. Moderate dryness is also maintained. Strawberry bushes should be well lit and ventilated. In the spring, a moderate amount of fertilizer is applied, as it acts in the opposite direction, reducing the immunity of already weak strawberries.
How to care for strawberries : beds with strawberries are mulched to prevent gray rot from appearing. The procedure simultaneously preserves moisture and protects against bacteria, mold and fungi that love its excess. You can use: straw, pine needles, sawdust, peat.
How to process strawberries : In spring and after harvest, strawberries are treated with copper oxychloride.
Black rot on a strawberry bush
Black rot manifests itself in almost the same way as gray rot: a grayish-white coating forms on the strawberries on the bush, after which it acquires a characteristic gray color. What is the difference between gray rot and black rot? The difference is that black rot appears on harvested strawberries, and gray rot on still growing ones.
Causes of black rot : causes are similar to gray mold disease. It is also worth noting that black rot is detected mainly during transportation of berries - in closed rooms or boxes there is a risk of damaging the entire crop, and in a fairly short time.
Prevention of gray rot: Strawberries, as it has already turned out, are sown in lighted, open places. Regular ventilation, moderate fertilizing in the spring and watering the rest of the time prevent the appearance of black rot.
How to care for strawberries : beds with strawberries are sprinkled with wood ash. It is also used to treat row spacing and inhibits the spread of black rot. In the fall, be sure to remove old foliage and do not forget about weeding, since spores remain in the residue.
How to process strawberries : in spring and autumn, water with manganese solution for disinfection.
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The topic of today's article is photo strawberry pests and their treatment. Strawberries are grown by many summer residents for sale, for their diet. It is believed that the crop is not demanding on living conditions, rarely gets sick, and produces a rich harvest.
The berry is conventionally divided into two types: . Proper care and disease prevention allow you to preserve the harvest as much as possible.
In this article we will look at what strawberry pests there are, photos of their treatment, and preventive measures.
The most popular reason for strawberries to wilt is not enough water. How often do you water the plants and monitor the soil moisture? If the watering is in order, suspicions arise that there is or.
Both of these pests make underground passages and feed on the roots of the crop. As a result, the strawberries may fall as if decimated, and not just wither. It is not so easy to catch a mole cricket; it adapts to folk methods.
The first preventive measure is drugs directly into the hole to the roots during planting of young trees and caring for adult plantings. In the fall, you can make a trap for mole crickets. To do this, a hole up to half a meter is dug and filled with horse manure.
The mole cricket from all over the garden will crawl there to spend the winter; it’s warm in the pit. With the onset of cold weather, pests are destroyed, and the remaining manure is used as for the soil.
The cause of strawberry wilting may be phytosporosis, verticillium or fusarium. These diseases are treated with products purchased at a gardening store.
In addition, strawberries can also wither due to root rot. As soon as a plant loses its appearance, the reason for this must be immediately determined. Timely diagnosis is 50% of treatment.
Why do strawberries dry out? What to do?
Are strawberries drying out instead of fruiting? The reason for this may be the diseases listed above. Additionally, the culture is checked for fungal infections.
Strawberries dry out from late blight, verticellosis wilt, gray rot, spotting and powdery mildew. Before starting preventive measures, a diagnosis is carried out.
Damaged bushes found are dug up and burned. In the case of a large affected area, severely damaged bushes are burned, and the remaining plants are treated with fungicides.
This situation occurs due to gray rot damage even at the fruit set stage. The best treatment for these diseases is prevention.
In autumn and spring, strawberries are treated with special products and plant care technology is followed.
Rotting berries are another problem that can ruin your harvest. Its cause is root, brown or black rot. The diseases are caused by fungal spores. A favorable environment for the development of pests is high humidity.
Sometimes rot develops in conditions where the crop bushes grow too densely in a small area, and the strawberries have nowhere to grow. The ripening fruits cannot breathe, touch the damp soil and begin to rot.
As preventive measures, it is recommended to mulch the soil, sprinkle the soil between the bushes with small sawdust and timely removal of rotten fruits. Make sure that the green berries do not touch the ground. This causes the strawberries to rot and rot.
Closer to autumn, strawberry leaves turn reddish. This effect is considered normal due to the loss of pigment, the beginning of wilting, and the crop is preparing for winter.
At the same moment, the disease septoriasis appears as red spots. Belongs to a fungal group of pests that can ruin the harvest. Sometimes the plant reacts with reddish leaves to the acidic soil of the site.
You can correct the situation using dolomite flour. If it doesn’t help, then the cause is not in the soil and the disease needs to be treated.
The cause of yellow leaves may be non-infectious chlorosis. This suggests that the root system of the plant cannot provide it with normal growth; there are not enough nutrients.
The problem is solved by feeding with preparations containing iron and regulating the watering regime. Another reason for yellowing of leaves is xanthosis.
This pest is popularly called jaundice or mosaic. Most often, the disease is carried by aphids. It is possible to drive away aphids using traditional methods; xanthosis cannot be treated. Take time to prevent this disease.
In spring and autumn, plants are treated with 3% Bordeaux mixture or 1.5% nitrophen solution. This is enough to grow a healthy crop.
With the arrival of the harvest, there are more people wanting to eat strawberries. Birds eat the berries if you don't do anything about it. The simplest protection is pegs around the perimeter of the bed and a large net thrown over them.
Another way is to hang the New Year's rain on twine. To do this, they drive meter-long sticks around the bed, attach ropes, and hang rain or tinsel on them. When the wind fluctuates, the tinsel will rustle, scaring away pests.
The slug will not be able to crawl to the strawberry through such an obstacle. If they have already appeared, radical measures such as potassium salt or superphosphate are selected and scattered around the area.
The substance irritates the surface of the larvae. But, you need to do it several times a day, every hour. Film is considered effective. It creates a steam room effect and the worms die. Meta or Thunderstorm are used for the same purpose.
Weevils attack raspberries, strawberries, and wild strawberries. The pest overwinters between old leaves on the ground. A female is considered scary because she chews through strawberry stalks, eats the buds and lays eggs there.
The beetle is quite dangerous; each female is capable of eating up to 50 flowers. If a pest is detected, you need to treat the bushes with karbofos, corsair or another drug from this group.
See the instructions for dosage. Treatment is done a week before the plant begins to flower. Prevention of the appearance of weevils is done in the spring before flowering or in the fall after the berries have left. The drug used is Zolon or Actellik; how to use them is written in detail in the instructions.
The voracious larvae are capable of destroying the roots of an adult pine tree in a day, not to mention strawberries and bushes. The pest is considered dangerous; the larvae are collected by hand and then destroyed.
Treating bushes with Nemabact is considered a good way to prevent and control larvae. Efficiency up to 90%, contains living organisms. Read the instructions carefully before using the product.
The only way to use the folk method is to prevent the appearance of larvae. 0.3 wind of onion peel, pour a bucket of water and infuse for 5 days. Then the infusion is diluted with another bucket of water and the beds are watered with it. Strawberries become unattractive to slugs.
The beetle reaches a size of 4 millimeters and is yellow-brown in color. It feeds on strawberry leaves and flowers. If you do not pay attention to the appearance of a pest, then there will be nothing to save. The beetles destroy all the greenery in the garden bed in a matter of days.
Females lay hundreds of eggs, the larvae appear after a couple of weeks and begin to feed heavily. You can get rid of a beetle mechanically only at the first stage of its appearance. Subsequently, special preparations are used.
It is possible to catch adult beetles with a special trap with a light source. To do this, take a deep basin, place a light source on its bottom, and coat the edges of the basin with a sticky agent.
The beetles fly to the light, but can no longer get out of the basin. At dawn, you harvest the pests and systematically destroy them.
- beneficial insects, provided that they do not live in the strawberry bed. Here they are capable of causing trouble. The ants eat the strawberry crop and bring aphids with them.
It is known from biology that ants grow aphids for their food. As a result, together with such guests, you get a double pest in the garden beds.
A slow-acting poison is considered an effective remedy for ants. Poisonous food is laid out in the garden bed, the ants take it to the nursery, feed it to their family, the queen, and die as a whole colony. The method of exterminating pests is not very ethical, but very effective.
Nematodes are microscopic insects that damage the leaves of strawberry bushes and spoil their stalks. The pest enters the garden bed mainly with plant seedlings, so carefully monitor what seedlings you buy.
It is quite possible to get rid of a guest in the early stages, when the affected area is small. You can get rid of the nematode only with special preparations or a thermal solution. It is better to check how to prepare it in a store for summer residents. Each product has its own technology of use.
Strawberries suffer from cobweb and strawberry blight. . Both of these pests multiply quickly, feed on plant sap, and lead to the destruction of entire strawberry plantations. The mites leave behind dry, curled leaves.
It is easier to prevent guests from appearing than to get rid of them. A preventative measure is considered to be spring and autumn treatment of plants with phosphamide, metaphos or karbofos. Another similar treatment is carried out before the strawberry flowering period.
If you are late with prevention and there are already mites, you can pour a hot solution of potassium permanganate on them. The temperature of the liquid must be at least 65 degrees Celsius. The ideal environment for ticks is dry soil. Adjust the plant watering schedule.
In general, caring for strawberries does not create problems, and timely prevention of diseases and pests will allow you to get a rich harvest.
We hope you liked the article “Strawberry Pests Photos and Their Treatment” and found it useful!
Gray rot on strawberries is a fungal infection of the berries and the entire plant. It is impossible to confuse this disease with others.
Its external manifestations fully correspond to the name - the berries are covered with a gray layer of “fluffy” mycelium, rot, and spread gray clouds of spores around themselves, which continue to infect everything around.
In different years, depending on weather conditions, gray rot can destroy from 50 to 90% of the berry crop. It is impossible to defeat such an enemy once and for all. The causative agents of the disease live in the soil and plant debris and do not die when frozen in winter or dried out in summer.
But this is not a reason to give up, because gray rot threatens many vegetables, berries, even rose bushes. Methods of combating the disease are the same for all crops; they will help keep the garden healthy and fruitful. 
Strawberry varieties resistant and susceptible to gray rot
There are no varieties of garden strawberries that are absolutely immune to gray rot. From year to year, under different weather conditions, the incidence of varieties fluctuates. You should choose early-ripening varieties - quickly ripened berries do not have time to “stale” and get sick. But among them there are varieties with delicate pulp, which is easily affected by fungus.
Strawberry varieties resistant to gray rot:
- Leningradskaya Pozdnaya;
- Aliso;
- Marvelous;
- Ruby Pendant;
- Redgauntlit;
- Early Dense;Talka;
- VIR Beam;
- Olympus;
- Festival Chamomile;
- Ducat;
- Bravo;
- Fireworks;
- Bohemia.
Strawberry varieties that are highly susceptible to gray mold include:
- Hope;
- Beauty of Zagorje;
- Generous;
- Krasnoselskaya;
- Cinderella;
- Zenga Zengana;
- Relay race
Causes of gray rot on strawberries
Sooner or later, every summer resident encounters this garden infection. It is important to know that the following factors increase the risk of a problem:
- like high humidity
- overwatering
- frost
- as well as an abundance of weeds in the garden
Spores of a dangerous fungus are spread by moisture or carried by insects from a diseased plant to a healthy one.
External signs of gray rot
It is easy to identify plants affected by gray rot - individual dark spots first appear on the berries, which grow very quickly, covering the entire berry with a thick grayish coating (these are fungal spores). Brownish spots with a gray coating also appear on the leaves. 
Strawberries that are in direct contact with the ground and with affected plant debris are the earliest to develop gray rot. The disease develops very quickly, especially if the weather is rainy and cold during the berry ripening period. If, when caring for garden strawberries in the spring after the plants bloom, you mulch the soil with hay, straw, sawdust, etc., the possibility of infection of the berries will significantly decrease.
The development of this disease is facilitated by thickened and overgrown plantings, where constant humidity promotes the germination of spores of this fungus.
Prevention of strawberries against gray rot
- Keep the soil free of weeds
- Sprinkle the soil with ash or lime
- Shortly before flowering, it is useful to treat the plantings with Bordeaux mixture or the Barrier preparation.
- After harvesting, all leaves must be removed from the plantings, but this must be done in such a way that the bushes have time to grow healthy leaves before the onset of frost.
- It is advisable to alternate rows of strawberry bushes with rows of onions or garlic.
- Change the place where the crop is grown at least once every three years.
- Use pine litter or straw as mulch.
- Remove diseased berries promptly and completely.
- Harvest the ripe crop quickly and completely.
Varieties with peduncles located above the leaves are less affected by rot. 
Chemicals against gray rot on strawberries
In the fight against gray rot using chemical methods, it is very important to thoroughly cover the entire plant with the drug solution. The first treatment should be carried out at the beginning of flowering, and in case of an emergency, treatments should be continued every 5-7 days until the start of harvest, observing the waiting period for the preparations. As a rule, when growing in open ground, 3 or 4 treatments are needed; in protected ground, 1 or 2 treatments may be sufficient. The fight against gray mold on plantations of day-neutral varieties becomes especially difficult - simultaneous flowering and harvesting does not allow the use of most drugs, so it is important to use drugs with a short waiting period or use biological control methods. Another important part of proper chemical protection is the correct choice of drugs.
Alirin-B. Biological fungicide in tablets. Processing of strawberries with Alirin-B is carried out in 2 stages:
- before the flowering phase – 1-2 times;
- after flowering - 2-3 times (repeated spraying a week later until signs of infection disappear).
The dosage of the drug is 2-3 tablets per 1 liter. water, for prevention – 1-1.5 tablets. They are first dissolved in a small container, and then the liquid solution is added to the total volume. 
Fertilizer for pepper seedlings at home
It is recommended to carry out no more than two sprays with a minimum interval of 7 days. The average dose of the drug is 10 g per 5 liters. The dose is dissolved in 1/3 of the required volume, after which the reservoir is completely filled.
Treatment of strawberries from rot with folk remedies
- An effective defense against gray rot is iodine. It is used to prepare the composition in a proportion of 10 drops per 10 liters. water. Spraying must be done at least once a week both as a preventive measure and when signs of the disease appear.
- Mustard solution is also used against rot. To treat strawberries in the spring, prepare with a composition prepared according to the recipe: 50 g of dry powder per 5 liters. water. It should be hot, but not boiling water. Infusion time – 48 hours. The composition is filtered and diluted in a 1:1 ratio.