IS LEAF LITTER REMOVAL MORE EFFICIENT THAN LEAF LITTER SHREDDING TO CONTROL APPLE SCAB? A FIRST ANSWER IN A COMMERCIAL ORGANIC ORCHARD

In organic apple orchards, sanitation practices are a keystone of a sustainable scab management. Because the suppression of the inoculum by leaf litter removal could be a promising practice, we carried out an experiment to assess the interest of leaf removal versus leaf shredding on disease development and fruit damages. For one of the two cultivars studied, we showed that leaf litter removal can significantly decrease scab damages on fruit and leaf in comparison to leaf shredding.