Horse Chestnut disease?

[sid]

What's happening to the Horse Chestnut trees? All those in our area have gone brown and the leaves are dropping although the 'conkers' look OK. Is this a result of the earlier humid weather; is it a disease, or have the trees decided to finish early this year? Will they recover?

Sid

[Pierre ZFP]

I heard a report on the Beeb the other day which said that many plants have already decided it's Autumn and are shedding leaves/producing fruit etc.  Don't recall hearing what the long term effects might be for the plants.  Another question is that if the plants are much earlier in producing their 'harvest' what happens to birds/animals that rely on this happening later in the year? 

[Patf]

I've noticed this early browning of horse chestnut leaves for the last few years (Gers). I don't want to be the carrier of doom and gloom but I think I heard that there's a disease similar to dutch elm but not so serious. Having said that there are lots of new elms around here which are doing quite well now. Pat.

[Jacqui Too]

[quote user="Pierre ZFP"]I heard a report on the Beeb the other day which said that many plants have already decided it's Autumn and are shedding leaves/producing fruit etc.  Don't recall hearing what the long term effects might be for the plants.  Another question is that if the plants are much earlier in producing their 'harvest' what happens to birds/animals that rely on this happening later in the year? [/quote]

My garden here in Shropshire the trees are certainly turning into autumn mode, I have been sweeping up dead leaves for days now and many are turning brown on the edges, also I have a large leaved ornamental vine over the terrace which has already got its autumn red colour on many of its leaves

My horses have also started shedding their summer coats a month ago! and that's a whole two months early [:-))]

Jackie

[Gardengirl]

I saw many diseased-looking horse chestnut trees a couple of months ago when out on a ramble along the Thames, beyond Hurley. They were spread over a large area. I remember hearing something last year on Radio 4 about the problems of organisers obtaining sufficient conkers for the annual conker competition - wonder if that was due to the same cause.

Jo

[chris pp]

Apparently it's a newish problem that's sweeping across Europe caused by a horse chestnut leaf miner, although it will not kill the mature trees it does cause all the leaves to turn brown and fall prematurely. The only way to reduce the problem is to collect all the fallen leaves and burn them, strangely enough I think it started in Holland.

Chris

 

[sid]

Chris

Thanks for that information. I've done a search on 'leaf miner' in Google and found some pictures of leaves attacked by leaf miner and they match what we have here. The leaves have brown spots and some edge curl, not at all like the normal autumn browning.

I think you're spot-on with the diagnosis.

Sid