Green Spruce Tree Diseases

Colorado blue spruce is particularly susceptible and can be severly damaged by this disease.

Green spruce tree diseases.

Within a few years after treatment an infested spruce tree can look beautiful again. As the name implies trees with needlecast diseases shed needles. Needlecasts tip blights and canker diseases. Last week we reported that the malady appears to consist of two previously known diseases of spruce that is a branch death and needlecasting see spruce tree problem shows symptoms of both needlecast and branch death.

Needle blight and needle cast can be treated with a fungicide approved for fungal diseases on spruce trees. This is an important defoliator of spruce douglas fir true fir and other conifers. All of these diseases are caused by fungal pathogens and each produce specific symptoms that can be useful in diagnosing the problem. They first turn yellow then purplish brown and finally fall off.

Needle cast diseases of spruce are treatable. Rhizosphaera needle cast is a common disease of spruce trees and affects all ages of needles. Left untreated a severe case of needle cast can lead to continual thinning and eventual decline of the affected tree if spring weather is conducive to infection year after year. Rhizosphaera needle cast is a common foliar disease of spruces and other conifers caused by the fungus rhizosphaera kalkhoffii.

It was not immediately apparent what was causing these symptoms.