late frost flower damage

Symptoms

Blossoms turn brown and shrivel right after bloom, dropping without setting fruit, no fungal signs (distinguishes from Monilinia).

Easily confused with

• Sharka (plum pox)

  How to tell them apart: Plum Pox Virus (Sharka) on apricot shows persistent, systemic symptoms that appear on the whole canopy regardless of frost history: diffuse chlorotic rings, pale-green to yellow blotches and a vein-banding mosaic spread evenly across mature, fully-formed leaves, and faint chlorotic rings or rings/spots developing on the fruit skin and stone. The pattern is symmetrical and recurs year after year on the same trees, intensifying through the growing season. Late frost on apricot, by contrast, is a one-off event tied to a cold night during or just after bloom: damage is concentrated on the most exposed shoot tips and outer/lower canopy, with browned, water-soaked then necrotic blossom petals and pistils, scorched leaf margins, puckered or distorted young leaves, and no ring patterns on fruit (frost rather causes a corky russet band or aborted fruitlets). If chlorotic rings and mosaic persist on healthy mature foliage well past any frost and reappear annually, suspect Plum Pox Virus, not frost.