UC Dry Bean Blog

A baby lima bean field in the Sacramento Valley was recently found to be infected with southern blight (Sclerotium rolfsii), a fungal pathogen that's found in many crops. The field was double-cropped with barley and planted late June.

I visited a lima bean field in the Delta at the beginning of June. The beans were showing what appeared to be dampening off symptoms (Figure 1), and dying plants were leaving large gaps down the rows. The problem was pretty widespread throughout the field.

A field in Sutter County was confirmed to have charcoal rot, also known as dry root rot or ashy stem blight, which is caused by the fungus Macrophomina phaseolina.

Several garbanzo fields in the Sacramento Valley were infected with alfalfa mosaic virus, a disease that's vectored by aphids. Plant symptoms of viral infections include yellowing wilting, stunting, and dieback.

This spring, we found a garbanzo bean field in the Sacramento Valley with fusarium root rot, identified by our new UCCE Plant Pathologist, Cassandra Swett at UC Davis. Fusarium root rot, caused by the fungus, Fusarium solani f. sp. ciceris, attacks the underground stems and roots of plants.