New Bacterial Disease Mimics Iron Deficiency in Corn
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- Ken Obasa of Texas A&M AgriLife Research and Extension Center and Dennis Coker of Texas A&M AgriLife Extension Services identified Pantoea agglomerans as the cause of a new disease they named Pantoea-Induced Interveinal Chlorosis (PIC), first spotted in 2023 on wild grasses in the northwestern Texas Panhandle before spreading to nearby corn and sorghum fields.
- The disease produces bright lemon-green foliar discoloration and interveinal chlorosis that mimics iron deficiency, yet soil and tissue tests showed symptomatic plants actually contained higher iron levels than healthy plants, with a random field distribution pointing to a biological cause.
- Affected plants were stunted and developmentally delayed with reduced reproductive growth, and in severe cases failed entirely to reach the reproductive stage.
- Obasa warned that farmers may spend extra money on supplemental iron applications that fail to address the underlying bacterial infection, and urged agronomists to test symptomatic plants before recommending treatment.
- The study noted unusual biological behavior in the pathogen, including dimorphism and what may be a distinct genotype of P. agglomerans, with researchers still investigating how the bacterium spreads between plants.
- The findings were published in Plant Health Progress (DOI: 10.1094/php-07-25-0184-rs), with implications for farmers domestically and globally.
Why it matters: Farmers in the Texas Panhandle and beyond could waste money on iron supplements that don't address the real bacterial cause, increasing production costs without yield benefit. The discovery, published in Plant Health Progress, gives agronomists a diagnostic target (P. agglomerans) and a reason to test before treating — a small change in protocol that protects margins on corn and sorghum acres worldwide.
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