Help! My Dad's Vine has some sort of lurgy!

[MGSteve]

Hi, this is my first post here, so please go gently with me

I'm currently over in Spain at my Dad's place (my wife and I have an allotment back in the UK, so this site will be a good resource for us when we returnt too!).

However, the vine appears to have some sort of lurgy. The leaves curl up and are covered in, for lack of a better term, spots or blisters. There doesn't appear to be anything living in them, thankfully.

Does anyone have any ideas as to what the problem is?

[Capsid]

Blister mite?

[littlemark]

Looks a bit like Phylloxera, which is a pretty nasty pest of grape vines. Have a look at this: Defra, UK - Plant Health - Grape phylloxera

Mark

[MGSteve]

ok, thanks for the links.

However, that Defra link, whilst describing the problem, doesn't actually say how to fix it! The vine, looking at it, has been in place, acting as a screen around the pool for some years, they drastically cut it back to the ground last year (don't know if this infection happened last year as well or not). But its a big vine anyway.

Any recommendations for treatment, or is it a death sentence for the vine?

[TonyF]

Dig it out and burn it. If it is Phylloxera, it is a nightmare for grape vines and has, over the years, devastated large geographical areas of vines across the world.

It his this particular area of France twice which is why my commune and those surrounding it no longer have any wine production, just a few domestic vines.

[MGSteve]

Thanks for the help. I did a bit of googling after the last post and yeah, it does appear its pretty much a death sentence for the vine.

There is another Vine on the property, on the other side of the house to the pool, that one is OK at present.

The major problem is that we can't burn anything at the moment, there is a ban on fires until the end of August!

That said, you leave anything out in the sun for any period of time out here and it dries up within a couple of hours!

[greasyfire]

It has a virus, ther is nothing you can do about it apart from cutting of the bad shoots or getting a descent cutting