South Island orchard monitoring

KVH recently completed a monitoring round of 10 South Island orchards who supply budwood to North Island nurseries, Zespri and other growers. An additional eight orchards will be monitored by AgFirst in early/mid-December.

The purpose of this round was to confirm the region has no Psa positive orchards and that good vine management is in place to ensure budwood from unhealthy vines is not supplied to other growers or nurseries.

Five samples were taken of leaves with Psa like spotting, but all were confirmed Psa Not-Detected. Growers from the orchards monitored had systems in place to prevent budwood from vines showing any unusual symptoms being collected and distributed.