Agriculture officials have expanded the areas quarantined for sweet orange scab (SOS) in the Los Angeles and Villa Park areas of Los Angeles and Orange counties in California. The U.S. Department of Agriculture Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) in cooperation with the California Department of Food and Agriculture (CDFA) expanded the quarantine. SOS is a disease caused by the fungus Elsinöe australis.
AFFECTED AREAS
APHIS is expanding the quarantined area by 59 square miles in Los Angeles County and 6 square miles in Orange County. APHIS is taking this action because of SOS detections in plant tissue samples collected from residential properties in Los Angeles and Orange counties. This expansion does not impact commercial citrus.
APHIS is applying safeguarding measures pertaining to the interstate movement of regulated articles from the quarantined areas in California. This measure parallels the intrastate quarantine that CDFA established on Feb. 6. This action is necessary to prevent the spread of the disease to non-infested areas of the United States.
ABOUT THE DISEASE
The APHIS Sweet Orange Scab website has information on this disease, federal orders, approved packinghouse procedures and a description of current quarantined areas.
Earlier this year, APHIS and CDFA expanded the sweet orange scab quarantine in the Santa Ana area of Orange County in California. Learn more about that expansion here.
Many citrus species and hybrids are vulnerable to SOS. Infection causes scab pustules that give fruit a corky appearance. SOS can stunt young nursery trees or new field plantings and cause premature fruit drop.
In the United States, sweet orange scab was first detected in 2010 in residential citrus trees in Texas. It has since been confirmed in Alabama, Arizona, California, Florida, Louisiana and Mississippi.
Source: APHIS
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