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Brown spots on bush beans #261486

Asked July 13, 2015, 12:01 PM EDT

I planted various types of bush beans in my raised bed garden. This is a newly built raised bed with quality soil put in it. My bush beans started right up but now the leaves have brown spots. After the leaves have the spots, they desiccate and curl up. The damage started at the bottoms of the plants but now the damage is not confined to that area and is all over the plants. I have later planted beans that are coming up and they, too, are getting these brown spots.I have added some pictures to show the damage. The plants do have flowers. What is happening? Can I do anything? I do sprinkle the raised bed from the top since that is how my lawn and garden system is set up ,and I do have to be able to water when I go away.

County Wyoming

Expert Response

This appears to be a leaf blight, most likely bacterial leaf blight. It is a fairly common disease on beans. Frequent watering which wets the leaves can increase the severity of the disease. We are seeing quite a bit of this and other similar problems this year due to the unusually wet weather we've had. We can't do much to control the weather, but we can manage irrigation by using drip irrigation rather than overhead sprinklers. This can reduce infection. Crop rotation is a good management strategy too - i.e. don't plant beans in the same place next year. As for the infected plants, they may survive but yield will most likely be reduced. 

Here is some good information on leaf blight in beans. http://pnwhandbooks.org/plantdisease/bean-all-phaseolus-vulgaris-common-bacterial-blight-common-blig…

Thanks for the question.

Replied July 15, 2015, 4:17 PM EDT

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