Hello,
I was wondering if someone has already worked on reducing apple scab infection with cobalt. Indeed it seems that cobalt reduce free arginine in leaf and thus impact the development of ascospore. If some of you have papers on this topic this will be really nice.
Thank you!
Dear Alexandre Flouret sorry to see that your very interesting technical question has not yet received any expert answers. As an inorganic chemist I'm not really a specialist in this field. However, it might be of interest to you having a look at the following link:
Preventive medicine for crops
https://www.farm-news.com/2016/03/12/preventive-medicine-for-crops/
It is stated here that (citation): "Apple scab is a result of a cobalt deficiency, which creates a build up of an amino acid, arginine. This in turn makes the apple susceptible to a fungus, Venturia inaequalis, which causes the scab. After three cobalt foliar applications the next growing season the orchard produced apples with zero apple scab problems, without using a fungicide."
I also came across a potentially helpful YouTube tutorial video:
Nutritional Treatment For Apple Scab
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vk2jm3aMa2Q
I hope this information is of some use. Good luck with your work and best wishes, Frank Edelmann
Dear Edelmann
Thank you for your input! I had read about this work, it's a bit sad that the work of Mr. KEMPF lacks a bit of data. Anyway, I began a trial with different concentrations of CoSO4 in an apple field close to my lab I will see how think will go =).
Have a nice day