Impacts of COVID-19 on the Green Industry

The COVID-19 pandemic has forced many horticultural businesses to alter the way they operate. This includes, but may not be limited to, changing hours of operation, working with limited staff, and restricting customer access indoors. This could result in several challenges for businesses. In this study, we evaluate the impacts of COVID-19 on the green industry in the U.S. and identify the challenges for businesses. Based on our research findings, the major challenges faced by businesses were not having enough employees and inventory to keep up with consumer demand during COVID-19. We also evaluate the effect of the pandemic on the sales of different plants, gardening products/services, and the overall revenues of businesses. For different types of plants included in the survey, landscape herbaceous flowers, landscape shrubs, and landscape trees showed the most significant increase in sales. In addition, for different gardening products/services, container plants, small plants, and soil and compost showed the most significant increase in sales. A total of 64% of the businesses reported higher overall sales compared to the same season’s previous year, while less than 24% of the businesses reported decreased sales. Moreover, over 46% of the businesses indicated that COVID-19 had positively affected their sales in 2020, while 31% thought that it had negatively impacted their sales. These findings imply a greater demand potential for plants and gardening products/services from consumers, during this pandemic.

Impacts of COVID-19 on the Horticultural Industry

The COVID-19 pandemic has forced businesses to alter the way they operate. This includes, but may not be limited to, changing hours of operation, working with limited staff, and restricting customer access indoors. This could result in several challenges for businesses. In this study, we evaluate the impacts of COVID-19 on the horticultural industry and identify the challenges for businesses). Based on our research findings, the major challenges faced by businesses were not having enough employees and inventory to keep up with consumer demand during COVID-19. We also evaluate the effect of the pandemic on the sales of different plants, gardening products/services, and the overall revenues of businesses. For different types of plants included in the survey, landscape herbaceous flowers, landscape shrubs, and landscape trees showed the most significant increase in sales. In addition, for different gardening products/services, container plants, small plants, and soil & compost showed the most significant increase in sales. 64% of the businesses indicated higher overall sales compared to same season previous year. Over 46% of the businesses reported increased sales in 2020 under COVID-19. These findings imply a greater demand potential for plants and gardening products/services from consumers, in light of this pandemic.

Carbon Footprint of Landscape Tree Production in Korea

Landscape trees sequester carbon during their growth processes, but they emit carbon through production in nurseries, which may offset carbon uptake. This study quantified the carbon footprint of landscape tree production. After determining the scope of life cycle for landscape tree production, the energy and material used to produce trees of a target size were analyzed by conducting a field survey of 35 nurseries. This energy consumption and input material were converted to an estimate of carbon emitted using data on carbon emission coefficients. The net carbon uptake was 4.6, 12.2, and 24.3 kg/tree for trees with a DBH of 7, 10, and 13 cm, respectively. Thus, even though carbon is emitted during the production process, landscape trees can act as a source of carbon uptake in cities that have high energy consumption levels. This study broke new ground for quantifying the carbon footprint of landscape tree production by overcoming limitations of the past studies that only considered carbon uptake due to absence of data on energy consumption and difficulty of field survey. These study results are expected to provide information on the carbon footprint of landscape trees and to be useful in determining optimal greenhouse gas emissions reduction goal through urban greenspaces.

Taxonomy and bioecology of Hemiptera Diaspididae in fruit and landscape trees

Scales damage many plants such as apples, pears, plums, quinces, peaches, almonds, hawthorn, pine, poplar and other orchards and ornamental trees. According to the taxonomic composition of the fauna of scales found in fruit and ornamental plants of Tashkent province in Uzbekistan, the number of generations in the family Diaspididae in the fauna is 18 (Diaspidiotus, Diaspis, Dynaspidiotus, Unaspis, Shansiaspis, Salicicola, Parlatoria, Lepidosapis, Lepidosaphes, Lepidosaphes, Lepidosaphes Carulaspis, Rhizaspidiotus, and Pseudaulacaspis), and the number of species was 30. Diaspidiotus (8 species, 26.6%) and Lepidosaphes (4 species, 13.3%) predominate in the distribution of species, while Diaspis, Dynaspidiotus, Unaspis, Shansiaspis, Salicicola, Parlatoria, Leucaspis, Aulacaspis, Aonidia, and Chon. The number of species of the genus Chlidaspis, Prodiaspis, Mercetaspis, Carulaspis and Rhizaspidiotus is monotypic, the representatives of the genus Parlatoria and Chionaspis have 2 species and account for 13.3% of the total fauna. Aonidia, Chlidaspis, Prodiaspis, Mercetaspis, Carulaspis and Rhizaspidiotus genus have 1 species, accounting for 46.7% of the total fauna.

Seed Reproduction technology of the Magnolia grandiflora from seeds

This article highlights the results obtained on the basis of scientific research carried out in 2019-2020 on the technology of reproduction from the seeds of Magnolia grandiflora plant in the farmer’s farm named “Saydullo Temirov” specialized in the cultivation of landscape trees and shrubs located in the Uighur village of Pakhtaobod District of Andijan region. As a result of the study, determination of seed stratification time, planting time and methods, as well as maintenance work were determined, and conclusions were made.

The Ambrosia Beetle Sueus niisimai (Scolytinae: Hyorrhynchini) is Associated with the Canker Disease Fungus Diatrypella japonica (Xylariales)

Ambrosia beetles in the subtribe Hyorrhynchini are one example of an entire ambrosia beetle lineage whose fungi have never been studied. Here, we identify one dominant fungus associated with a widespread Asian hyorrhynchine beetle Sueus niisimai. This fungus was consistently isolated from beetle galleries from multiple collections. Phylogenetic analyses of combined ITS rDNA and β-tubulin sequences identified the primary fungal symbiont as Diatrypella japonica Higuchi, Nikaido & Hattori (Diatrypaceae, Xylariales, Sordariomycetes), which was recently described as a pathogen of sycamore (Platanus spp.) in Japan. To assess the invasion potential of this beetle-fungus interaction into the U.S., we have investigated the pathogenicity of two D. japonica strains on four species of healthy landscape trees native to the southeastern United States. Only Shumard oak (Quercus shumardii) responded with lesions significantly greater than the control inoculations, but there was no observable dieback or tree mortality. Although disease symptoms were not as prominent as in previous studies of the same fungus in Japan, routine reisolation from the inoculation point suggests that this species is capable of colonizing healthy sapwood of several tree species. Our study shows that the geographical area of its distribution is broader in Asia and potentially includes many hosts of its polyphagous vector. We conclude that the Sueus-Diatrypella symbiosis has high invasion potential but low damage potential, at least on young trees during the growing season.