What you don’t want this Christmas: needle necrosis

Scotland’s Christmas trees are under threat from a widespread mystery disease costing some growers hundreds of thousands of pounds.

The condition, called “current season needle necrosis”, affects the Nordmann fir, one of the most popular trees, causing its needles to turn brown and fall off.

Homegrown Nordmann firs are by far the most popular of the eight million Christmas trees sold in Britain each year, of which Scotland sells 2.5 million, but the foliage disorder makes them unsellable.

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Although Scotland has only suffered slightly from the condition, compared with parts of England, industry experts believe the disease is making inroads northwards.

A fungus Sydowia polyspora may be to blame, but it is not known what causes it and how it can be prevented.

The British Christmas Tree Growers Association (BCTGA) is to host an emergency meeting at the start of next year for its 350 members, who comprise three-quarters of UK growers.

Roger Hay, secretary of the BCTGA based in Edinburgh, said: “There’s some evidence of it affecting Scotland], but it is mainly in the south at the south. It is fairly widespread in terms of Europe and the United States.

“We first started to notice it three years ago, but it’s not reduced in effect during that time. It’s not universal, even within a farm it may just be one or two trees.”

He said there had been only a few recorded cases in Scotland, “but we’ve noticed it”.

One of the country’s biggest growers, Hans Alexandersen, revealed that he had already lost a fortune in written-off trees, which take about seven years to grow to 6ft.

Mr Alexandersen, who farms 600,000 Nordmann firs in Kent and Surrey, said: “I have been ringing the alarm bell because I have lost several hundred thousand pounds worth of trees.

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“The experts have identified a fungus, but still don’t know if it is the right one or how it works and have not found a cure for it. Trees can recover in future years, but when you have a plantation that has the disease, you don’t want to leave too many trees.”

Mr Alexandersen also owns fir tree plantations in Scotland, though not the Nordmann variety, and confirmed it was a problem in Scotland.

Horticultural expert Janet Allen, of consultancy firm ADAS, likened the disease to sunburn. She said: “About five years ago we started to see Nordmann firs showing this sort of necrosis. We are pretty certain the cause is a fungus, but we don’t know how it spores. and need to monitor climatic conditions before we can control it.

“The last two summers the hot, dry and bright weather in late June and July seem to have led to the fungus being active.”

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