New Zealand kiwifruit grower Seeka has found unwelcome symptoms of disease in kiwifruit strains thought to be tolerant of the devastating Psa-V bacterium, reports stuff.co.nz.
The company said orchard monitoring over the last week had detected more symptoms of Psa in green Hayward plants.
It had also detected further symptoms in G3, a recently-released 'tolerant' gold kiwifruit variety.
'While a level of detections may be expected, it is too early to tell what the significance of these current detections is,' the company is quoted as saying.'They are in any event an unwelcome development.'
Zespri, which has licensed some 2,000ha of the G3 cultivar to orchardists, had previously said that it did not know how the new variety will fare in commercial conditions.
The latest Kiwifruit Vine Health statistics show that Psa is now present across 47 per cent of New Zealand kiwifruit orchard land.
Every gold orchard in the heartland of production in Te Puke has been infected, and the majority of vines have been destroyed or grafted across to G3.
Seeka continued to caution the market that the Psa outbreak, now in its second year, had the potential to seriously impact on future earnings for the company.
The significance of the most recent detections would only be confirmed as spring continued.
