Quote:
Originally Posted by Swamper
I'm not surprised by your resluts. Does your test show all types of pathogens or are you just testing for virused ones?
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Just testing for Cymbidium mosaic virus and Odontoglossum ringspot virus with the Agdia ELISA strip test.
These are the most common viruses for orchids the first of which can cause a slow decline in the plant and its eventual death.
CymMV typically causes brown speckling on the leaves and plants that have thinner leaves are more likely to exhibit this symptom. It is not typical for this to cause a color break in the blooms but it can. It spreads typically from sloppy technique when handling plants. Sap-sap type of contact
ORSV on the other hand IS the color break virus. From what I have read, you can have water splash from one plant transmit it to another. It is very quick to cause decline in a plant and the blooms are ruined.
I have attached three photos of cattleyas with color break. The first two were the blooms I brought home from the nursery
a few years ago not knowing anything about viruses. The third is the blooming of one of them the following year. They were both discarded long ago.
Virus cannot be treated or eliminated in plants as fungal, bacterial and insect infestations can be eliminated. The youngest parts of the plants would have the least viral load so in testing I usually choose an older leaf, but not the "oldest" leaf
Again, a negative test is not 100% accurate as the viral load could just be too low.
There are other viruses we cannot test for as well!
So overall, I am just trying to keep a collection as healthy as possible.
Here's my analogy: just because we cannot detect every possible virus in our Blood Bank supply doesn't mean we don't test our blood supply for viruses we CAN detect. There was a time when we could not test for Hepatitis C but I can tell you if you get a transfusion now you should be very glad we can!
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