Spinach

Rapid foliar blight reduces plant vigor and yield; severe infections can kill leaves while stems and fruit often remain initially intact.

Favored By

Cool to moderate temperatures, prolonged leaf wetness, high humidity, cloudy weather, dense foliage, and windborne spores.

What It Looks Like

Angular yellow or pale-green spots on upper leaf surfaces with gray, purple, or dark downy growth beneath, most visible on humid mornings.

Prevention

Plant resistant cultivars where available; improve airflow; use drip irrigation; avoid overhead watering late in the day; remove volunteer hosts.

Management

Remove infected leaves or plants when practical; monitor regional forecasts for cucurbit downy mildew; use a crop-labeled preventive fungicide when local risk is high.

Seeds rot before emergence or young seedlings collapse, producing thin stands and sudden losses in flats or garden rows.

Favored By

Cold or waterlogged soil, contaminated mix or containers, poor drainage, deep sowing, dense seedlings, low light, and overwatering.

What It Looks Like

Pre-emergence seeds become soft and brown; emerged seedlings develop a water-soaked or pinched stem at the soil line and topple.

Prevention

Use sterile seed-starting mix and clean containers; sow at the proper depth; provide warmth, drainage, light, and airflow; avoid crowding and overwatering.

Management

Discard affected seedlings and nearby mix; reduce watering; improve light and airflow. Fungicides have limited value after collapse and must be specifically labeled.

Leaf, stem, and especially fruit infections produce sunken rots, reduce marketable harvest, and continue after picking.

Favored By

Warm wet weather, splashing rain, overhead irrigation, infected seed or residue, dense canopies, and overripe fruit.

What It Looks Like

Round sunken dark lesions on ripe fruit, sometimes with concentric rings of black dots or salmon-pink spore masses; leaves and stems may spot or canker.

Prevention

Use disease-free seed and resistant cultivars; rotate; mulch; stake plants; irrigate at soil level; harvest promptly; remove mummified fruit and debris.

Management

Pick and discard infected fruit; avoid handling wet plants; cool harvested produce promptly; apply crop-labeled fungicides preventively when local guidance recommends.

Blossoms, leaves, stems, and fruit rot; infections often enter through flowers, wounds, or dying tissue and can spread in storage.

Favored By

Cool to moderate humid weather, prolonged leaf wetness, crowding, poor airflow, dead blossoms, overripe fruit, and plant wounds.

What It Looks Like

Soft tan-to-brown rot covered by fuzzy gray spores; infected blossoms collapse and stems may develop pale cankers.

Prevention

Space and prune plants; ventilate protected growing areas; use drip irrigation; remove dead flowers and damaged tissue; harvest before fruit becomes overripe.

Management

Remove and discard infected tissue without shaking spores; lower humidity; sanitize harvest containers; use a labeled fungicide only when timed preventively.

Soilborne vascular infection blocks water movement, causing one-sided yellowing, chronic wilt, stunting, and eventual plant death.

Favored By

Warm soil, susceptible cultivars, infested soil or transplants, root injury, continuous host cropping, and some nematode damage.

What It Looks Like

Lower leaves yellow and wilt, often on one side; brown discoloration appears in vascular tissue when the lower stem is split lengthwise.

Prevention

Plant resistant cultivars and clean transplants; rotate with nonhosts; avoid moving infested soil; sanitize tools; manage root-knot nematodes.

Management

Remove entire infected plants and roots; do not compost. There is no curative home-garden treatment; use resistant varieties and long rotations in future seasons.

Stem and crown infections cause watery rot, wilting, lodging, and plant death in beans, lettuce, tomatoes, cucurbits, and many other crops.

Favored By

Cool moist weather, dense canopies, prolonged leaf wetness, poor airflow, flowering plants, and soils containing long-lived sclerotia.

What It Looks Like

Water-soaked lesions become bleached and covered with cottony white growth; hard irregular black sclerotia form inside or on stems.

Prevention

Rotate to grasses or other nonhosts; space and stake plants; use drip irrigation; control broadleaf weeds; remove infected plants before sclerotia mature.

Management

Pull and discard infected plants and nearby debris; reduce canopy moisture; avoid cultivating contaminated soil into new beds; fungicides are preventive, not curative.

Numerous lesions coalesce and kill foliage, reducing beet, chard, carrot, okra, and other crop growth and quality.

Favored By

Warm humid weather, long leaf wetness, overhead irrigation, infected residue, dense plantings, and susceptible weeds.

What It Looks Like

Small circular tan or gray spots with reddish-purple or dark borders; tiny dark fruiting bodies may be visible in pale centers.

Prevention

Rotate 2–3 years; remove residue and host weeds; space plants; irrigate at soil level early in the day; use resistant cultivars.

Management

Remove heavily infected leaves; do not overfertilize with nitrogen; apply a labeled fungicide preventively if disease has a history of severe damage.

Systemic viruses stunt plants, distort leaves and fruit, reduce yield, and persist for the plant's life.

Favored By

Aphids or other vectors, infected transplants or seed for some viruses, nearby weeds, continuous host plants, and mechanical sap transmission.

What It Looks Like

Light- and dark-green mosaic, yellow mottling, rings, shoestring or curled leaves, stunting, and bumpy or color-broken fruit; symptoms vary by virus and crop.

Prevention

Use virus-free seed and transplants; plant resistant cultivars; control weeds; use reflective mulch where practical; sanitize hands and tools.

Management

Remove symptomatic plants promptly; manage vectors early but recognize insecticides may not stop rapidly transmitted viruses. No treatment cures an infected plant.

Sap-feeding colonies distort tender growth, cause yellowing and sticky honeydew, and may transmit plant viruses.

Favored By

Soft new growth, excess nitrogen, sheltered plants, and warm moderate weather.

What It Looks Like

Tiny (about 1/16–1/8 in), soft, pear-shaped insects; green, black, yellow, gray, or pink; two tailpipe-like cornicles.

Prevention

Avoid excess nitrogen; inspect leaf undersides; conserve lady beetles, lacewings, hoverflies, and parasitoid wasps; control ants that protect aphids.

Management

Knock off with water; prune badly infested tips; use insecticidal soap or horticultural oil with thorough contact coverage. Repeat only as label directs.

Adults chew numerous small shot holes in leaves; seedlings can be stunted or killed. Some larvae feed on roots.

Favored By

Warm sunny weather, young seedlings, nearby weeds or crop residue, and repeated planting of susceptible crops.

What It Looks Like

Tiny (about 1/16–1/8 in), shiny dark or striped beetles with enlarged hind legs that jump when disturbed.

Prevention

Use row cover immediately after planting; remove weeds and residues; rotate crops; plant vigorous transplants or delay planting where practical.

Management

Remove cover at flowering when pollination is needed; use labeled kaolin clay or insecticides only when feeding threatens establishment.

Night-feeding caterpillars sever seedlings at soil level; climbing species also feed on foliage and fruit.

Favored By

Weedy ground, plant residue, green manure, and recently converted sod; small transplants are most vulnerable.

What It Looks Like

Smooth, stout, gray, brown, green, or black caterpillars, often striped or spotted; curl into a C when disturbed.

Prevention

Remove weeds and residue before planting; till before planting and in fall; use compost rather than fresh green manure; place collars around transplants.

Management

Search soil near damaged plants at dusk and handpick; treat small larvae with a labeled biological or insecticide only when damage is active.

Larvae chew ragged holes and may bore into cabbage heads; frass contaminates produce.

Favored By

Warm weather, continuous brassica plantings, and southern migrations of adult moths.

What It Looks Like

Green caterpillar with white side stripes and only two pairs of mid-abdominal prolegs; moves by looping its body.

Prevention

Use insect netting; destroy crop residues; remove crucifer weeds; scout weekly for eggs and small larvae.

Management

Handpick; apply Bt kurstaki while larvae are small or spinosad where labeled; rotate insecticide modes if repeated treatment is necessary.

Larvae tunnel between leaf surfaces, creating serpentine or blotchy mines that reduce photosynthesis and market quality.

Favored By

Warm weather, susceptible leafy crops, weeds, and broad-spectrum insecticide use that kills parasitoids.

What It Looks Like

Tiny dark flies are seldom noticed; pale legless larvae live inside leaves; mines are winding trails or translucent blotches.

Prevention

Use row cover; remove host weeds; inspect transplants; remove mined leaves before larvae exit; conserve parasitoid wasps.

Management

Crush larvae within mines or remove leaves; insecticides often miss protected larvae, so target adults/young larvae only with labeled selective products.

They rasp irregular holes in leaves, stems, seedlings, and low fruit and leave silvery slime trails.

Favored By

Moist shade, dense mulch, weeds, boards, stones, and frequent evening irrigation.

What It Looks Like

Soft-bodied mollusks; snails carry shells while slugs do not; active mostly at night or during wet weather.

Prevention

Water in morning; improve airflow and drainage; remove hiding places and weeds; keep mulch away from seedling stems; use barriers where practical.

Management

Handpick at night; use board traps; apply iron phosphate bait according to label and protect it from children, pets, and wildlife.

Microscopic roundworms induce root galls, restricting water and nutrient uptake and causing stunting, yellowing, and midday wilt.

Favored By

Warm sandy soil, susceptible crops, contaminated transplants or soil, and repeated host crops.

What It Looks Like

Microscopic; diagnosis relies on swollen knots or galls on roots, often with a weak uneven crop canopy.

Prevention

Use clean transplants; grow resistant cultivars; rotate with poor hosts; solarize soil in hot climates; add organic matter and clean tools.

Management

Remove heavily infested roots; use resistant crops and rotation over multiple seasons; soil-applied products are limited and must be labeled for home gardens.

Larvae feed on fungi and fine roots in seed-starting mix, weakening seedlings; adults are mostly a nuisance.

Favored By

Continuously wet organic potting media, algae, decaying roots, and poor drainage.

What It Looks Like

Tiny dark mosquito-like flies; larvae are clear-white with shiny black heads and live in the top layer of moist mix.

Prevention

Allow the surface to dry between watering; improve drainage and airflow; use clean pasteurized media; remove algae and dead tissue.

Management

Use yellow sticky cards for adults; apply Bacillus thuringiensis israelensis as a soil drench according to label; beneficial nematodes may suppress larvae.

Browse foliage, buds, flowers, and fruit; damage often occurs high above the ground with ragged torn stems.

Favored By

High deer density, drought or winter food shortage, gardens near woods, and unfenced plantings.

What It Looks Like

Large hoofed mammal; cloven tracks and pellet droppings; browsing can reach roughly 6 ft.

Prevention

Install an 8-ft deer fence or properly designed electric fence; use cages and netting; choose less-preferred plants while recognizing none are deer-proof.

Management

Exclude first; rotate repellents labeled for edible crops and reapply after rain; protect young trees with guards. Follow local wildlife laws.

Clip seedlings and tender stems, browse leafy greens and beans, and gnaw bark in winter.

Favored By

Dense cover, brush piles, fence gaps, drought, and abundant tender vegetation.

What It Looks Like

Small mammal with long ears and short white tail; leaves round pellets and clean, angled cuts close to the ground.

Prevention

Use 1-in poultry mesh at least 2 ft high with bottom buried 3–6 in; remove nearby cover; use trunk guards.

Management

Exclude and protect individual beds; use repellents labeled for edible crops; trapping or lethal control is regulated and should follow local law.

Consumes large amounts of vegetables and can flatten plants; burrows may undermine beds or structures.

Favored By

Gardens near field edges, brush, sheds, stone piles, and accessible fence bottoms.

What It Looks Like

Large stocky brown-gray rodent with short bushy tail; wide burrow entrances and tracks with four front toes and five rear toes.

Prevention

Use sturdy 3-ft wire fencing with 12 in buried or bent outward; add an outward electric wire; remove brush and block access under structures.

Management

Exclusion is most reliable; harassment and repellents have limited persistence; trapping or euthanasia must comply with state and local law.