What is wrong with my pear tree?

[BusyBee]

The leaves on my pear tree started turning black at the ends and some have orange spots. We haven't had any pears growing this year. What is happening to my pear tree and what can I do to fix it?

 

[MiniOrchardDude]

Does this happen every year or just the years it rains a lot? If it does I want to say it is fabraea. It is a bacterial leaf spot disease. It becomes apparent with lots of rain. The leaf ends turn brown and then sometines black. The only way I was able to combat this was to pull my european pears and replace with asian pears. Spraying all the time is not cost or time effective for me. It was easier to get Fabraea resistant trees. Asian varities are naturally more resistant to fabraea than european varities. My most resistant one is the Starking Giant Asian pear and 20th Century. Bartlet and Gem pears do OK but not as good as the asian. Just good enough to keep them so far. No fruit yet but i can see flower buds forming. I have another asian variiety that does well but forgot the name. LMK if interested I can look at the tag tonight.

MOD

 

[BusyBee]

It was planted more than 20 years ago. My father in law said it was labelled as a patio pear tree, so I'm not sure which kind of pear tree it is. Maybe a conference pear? We started to notice the leaves turning a funny colour sometime in the later half of last year. We've never had a problem with it before.

 

[BusyBee]

I had a closer look and it doesn't quite look like fabraea leaf spot.

 

[pepper]

I had a closer look and it doesn't quite look like fabraea leaf spot.

The orange stuff is orange rust, I'm 99% sure. I had it this year too on some trees, I cut them and took them to the landfill. Apparently once it sets in it stays with the tree and can spread to others.

 

[BusyBee]

Did you just remove the affected branches?

 

[pepper]

Did you just remove the affected branches?

No, I cut them all down but they didn't mean anything to me so I didn't care. In a case like the tree you have I would pick off the infected leaves and see if you can save it, it might be early enough in it's stage. Don't compost the leaves, put them in the garbage so it doesn't spread.

 

[pepper]

Did you just remove the affected branches?

It could be something else, mine didn't have black leaves like that. I'll see what I can find too, it might be more then just rust.

 

[MiniOrchardDude]

It could be something else, mine didn't have black leaves like that. I'll see what I can find too, it might be more then just rust.

The orange spot I also thought of rust but fabraea sort of starts as that color. I now believe it is rust with another issue. I hate to say this but it is probably fire blight since it barely started showing up.

MOD

 

[pepper]

The orange spot I also thought of rust but fabraea sort of starts as that color. I now believe it is rust with another issue. I hate to say this but it is probably fire blight since it barely started showing up.

MOD

Yes, I was looking at some pics and I think it's fire blight too.

 

[MiniOrchardDude]

I believe fire blight attacks the stems not the actual leaves. The leaves eventually get infected. Therefore you can cut off the infected stem. Work your way down to a clean leaf. If the infection is over all the leaves (every single leaf) then I would say it is fabraea.

MOD