Banana xanthomonas wilt (XW) caused by Xanthomonas campestris pv. musacearum (Xcm) attacks all banana cultivars. Xcm in inflorescence-infected Pisang Awak plants with wilting male bud bracts is restricted to the upper parts of the true stem; therefore, cutting these plants at the pseudostem base has been recommended to prevent further Xcm spread. In order to fine-tune existing control strategies, this study examined the movement of Xcm into plants and mats, in relation to disease incubation period. Mature Pisang Awak and East African highland (AAA-EA) plants were inoculated with Xcm through abscission wounds of female bracts, male bud bracts, male flowers, a combination of male bud bracts and flowers, and by cutting male buds with a contaminated machete. Thirty plants per genotype and treatment were monitored for 24 months for disease symptoms. An additional 68 AAA-EA and 33 Pisang Awak plants were sampled weekly to assess the rate of Xcm spread within the plants. All floral entry points resulted in disease, with the highest incidence in combined male bract and male flower abscission wound inoculations. The study confirmed the systemicity of Xcm, with the pathogen able to live within the mat for long periods (5-16 months) without causing disease. Reliance on disease symptom expression to manage XW is therefore not sufficient. The long incubation period in lateral shoots may explain the current resurgence of the disease in locations where the disease was thought to have been successfully eradicated.

In this study, the taxonomic position and group classification of the phytoplasma associated with a lethal yellowing-type disease (LYD) of coconut (Cocos nucifera L.) in Mozambique were addressed. Pairwise similarity values based on alignment of nearly full-length 16S rRNA gene sequences (1530 bp) revealed that the Mozambique coconut phytoplasma (LYDM) shared 100 % identity with a comparable sequence derived from a phytoplasma strain (LDN) responsible for Awka wilt disease of coconut in Nigeria, and shared 99.0–99.6 % identity with 16S rRNA gene sequences from strains associated with Cape St Paul wilt (CSPW) disease of coconut in Ghana and Côte d’Ivoire. Similarity scores further determined that the 16S rRNA gene of the LYDM phytoplasma shared <97.5 % sequence identity with all previously described members of ‘Candidatus Phytoplasma ’. The presence of unique regions in the 16S rRNA gene sequence distinguished the LYDM phytoplasma from all currently described members of ‘Candidatus Phytoplasma ’, justifying its recognition as the reference strain of a novel taxon, ‘Candidatus Phytoplasma palmicola’. Virtual RFLP profiles of the F2n/R2 portion (1251 bp) of the 16S rRNA gene and pattern similarity coefficients delineated coconut LYDM phytoplasma strains from Mozambique as novel members of established group 16SrXXII, subgroup A (16SrXXII-A). Similarity coefficients of 0.97 were obtained for comparisons between subgroup 16SrXXII-A strains and CSPW phytoplasmas from Ghana and Côte d’Ivoire. On this basis, the CSPW phytoplasma strains were designated members of a novel subgroup, 16SrXXII-B.

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