Virus Indexed

Virus Indexed

VID should mean they do not have a virus. VID is an expensive process, more than most nurseries think they can afford, so most nurseries do not do it.

I seem to remember asking Roses Unlimited once if their roses were virus indexed and they said no. But that is not unusual--as I said, most nurseries do not have virus indexed roses--which is why Vintage flaunts their VID--good selling point for them.

However, I often order from Roses Unlimited and I have received excellent plants from them, so I wouldn't worry about it.

Kate

This link to another thread on the topic might be helpful...

Here is a link that might be useful: old thread on virus-indexed roses

Actually, vmr423, that old thread contains or alludes to some of the most flagrant misinformation on mosaic, by the usual culprit. VID means that the plant has tested clean of Rose Mosaic, the only virus group other than rose rosette that American rose growers tend to be interested in (or have any reasonable reason to be interested in). Yes, there are many other viruses out there, but you are probably more likely to catch ebola or cowpox personally, than to have a rose in your garden with one of those other viruses that do any damage. Cryptoviruses are everywhere, but they are "crypto" specifically because they are "hidden," -- no symptoms and no measurable ill effect. So assuming the nursery is honest about it (most are), a "VID" rose should be free of any virus of any significant concern, other than rose rosette, which is seldom if ever indexed for. But it is so strongly symptomatic in the rose itself, it is to be hoped that you're not receiving it either.

Malcolm, could you explain about the various Rose Mosaic indexing programs in the US? VID and VI, I think, refer to roses treated by UC Davis, but I don't recall there are any special characters like this used to indicate a rose has gone through heat treatment at your program at Florida Southern. For me, this has been a problem because *many* nurseries say nothing at all about the origin of their roses (such as from a virus-indexed source) or whether any/all/few of them are indexed.

Vintage's last printed catalog for instance, "Vintage Garden's Book of Roses", does not contain an explanation of Rose Mosaic Virus, nor state whether Vintage had a policy regarding it. So while Vintage does list sources of their roses in the individual entries, unless one already knew that something coming from ROYAT was likely virused, while those roses coming from UC Davis would be clean, the reader would be none the wiser. Both the index of roses and individual entry descriptions do not list which roses are VI or VID even if they are, and the ones that came from Malcolm Manners at Florida Southern, well one has to skim the book and read each entry to see if this information is in the text description. A frustrating endeavor! The book would be much more useful as a reference work if what was known about Rose Mosaic status was shared.

I believe, somewhere or other on GardenWeb, you posted that at one time Heirloom was in the process of getting all their roses indexed (at Oregon or Washington State???? sorry I can't remember for sure the university mentioned) but you didn't know how far along they got before John Clements died.

Melissa

Tessiess, "VI" and "VID" are terms used by nurseries. They have no very specifically defined meaning, other than that they are letting you know that someone, somewhere, has done some sort of testing. There are several possibilities -- they could be doing their own ELISA work, using a kit from Agdia Inc. While this is feasible, I'm not aware of any nursery that actually does that. Certainly the most likely by far is that they sent them to UC Davis, which would do ELISA, Shirofugen cherry bioassay, and Burr Multiflora bioassay. Also possibly a few other tests, if they thought it prudent. Washington State U. at Prosser is the third possibility, where they do a very good job of ELISA. If the plants came through us, they were likely tested at Davis by Shirofugen as well as WSU Prosser by ELISA, and there's a good chance we also indexed them here at FSC on 'Mme. Butterfly' rose.

Over the years, I've become less insistent on lots of different tests since, in 30 years of working with mosaic, I have yet to find a single plant that tested clean by one method but then failed to test clean by another method, or which, if found infected by one method, failed to be seen as infected by all other methods; they always agree. So while, from a scientific research standpoint, it's good to use lots of different tests, just to be sure, I think at this point we can say that any of the tests commonly used does a really good job, assuming they're done correctly.

Yes, John Clements was pretty adamant about having disease-free plants, and at one time was sending samples of all their plants to WSU Prosser. I'm not sure where that all went, when John died.

Thanks for setting the record straight about the misinformation in the old thread- I'm fairly new to all this, myself.

The following was stated: "VID means that the plant has tested clean of Rose Mosaic, the only virus group other than rose rosette that American rose growers tend to be interested in (or have any reasonable reason to be interested in). Yes, there are many other viruses out there, but you are probably more likely to catch ebola or cowpox personally, than to have a rose in your garden with one of those other viruses that do any damage."

H.Kuska comment. Historically Rose Mosaic Virus was a group name for viruses that caused mosaic symptoms on roses. The home gardner did hot have the tools to determine which actual virus or viruses (mixed infections have been shown to occur) caused the observed symptoms. Even scientists working in the field did not have the tests to distinguish which of the now known 17 or so known virus caused the observed symptoms. This was explained in the link that vmr423 provided,

So, what is the basis for the statement: "Yes, there are many other viruses out there, but you are probably more likely to catch ebola or cowpox personally, than to have a rose in your garden with one of those other viruses that do any damage." i.e, What has been reported about the abundance of these other viruses?

The aphid spread rose spring dwarf virus has been reported to be found in about 20% of infected roses in Chile and in New Zealand and to be "widely prevalent " in California.
http://home.roadrunner.com/~kuska/rose_spring_dwarf_virus.htm
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Perhaps the Abstract of the New Zealand paper can illustrate that the question of how prevalent the newly discovered rose viruses are is not a settled question.
"Abstract
A survey was carried out to confirm which viruses infecting Rosa spp. are present in New Zealand and to determine the extent of their distribution. Eighty nine rose samples were collected from different regions across New Zealand and from various sources as follows, private and public gardens, a commercial glasshouse and native bush. The samples were tested by RT-PCR for 17 viruses known to infect roses. Of the 89 samples tested, 48 % were infected with Rose cryptic virus-1, 22 % with Prunus necrotic ringspot virus, 20 % with Rose spring dwarf-associated virus, 10 % with Rose yellow vein virus, 2 % with Arabis mosaic virus and 35 % of the samples tested negative. The viruses were detected in some samples as single infections and sometimes as mixed infections (2 or 3 viruses together). Viruses were detected in all regions sampled in both the North and South Islands of New Zealand. Rose cryptic virus-1 and Rose spring dwarf associated virus were detected for the first time in New Zealand and Rose yellow vein virus, which had only been recently detected in 2011, was found to be widespread. Viral symptoms included leaf chlorosis and chlorotic line patterns; leaf mottling and puckering; vein clearing and banding; misshapen and balled (rosette) leaves and flower break."

Please note that 35 % of the roses with symptoms did not match any of the known viruses. Of course the symptoms could have a non virus cause, but they could also suggest that there are more viruses that we still cannot easily test for. It would probably take an electron microscope study to resolve this question.

Please note that Rose Yellow Vein Virus was found in 10 % of the samples tested.
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Now, one can say that RoseYellow Vein Virus abundance information from other countries is not meaningful relative to how abundant it is in the U.S. That would be correct if there existed RoseYellow Vein Virus abundance studies in the U.S. Until such studies are done I cannot rule out the possibility that Nature is consistent. Definitely, since it has identified in the U.S. I would NOT expect: "you are probably more likely to catch ebola or cowpox personally, than to have a rose in your garden with one of those other viruses that do any damage."
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The following very recent paper of a new rose virus in Greece may be of interest as it does give some abundance information. However large scale experiments would have to be done to obtain statistically significant information,

http://www.rosebreeders.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=54383&p=55592&hilit=virus#p55592

Here is a link that might be useful: link to abstract of New Zealand paper.

The silliness has begun. Keep in mind that the previous poster has precisely no background in plant virology, has done precisely no research in the field, is in agreement with precisely zero (not one) virus researcher on the earth, Is in complete disagreement with absolutely everyone who knows anything at all about plant virology. Yet he continues to spew the ignorance. Yes the world is full of bad stuff. Is your garden or your favored mail-order nursery carrying the next end-of-the-world rose disease? Probably not. Should we now spend tens of thousands of words here on GardenWeb discussing things none of us has ever seen and will never, ever see, because someone reported a new viral find in the hill country of Tajikistan? Probably not.

As has been stated way too many times around here the ONLY viruses of ANY significant concern in roses in this country are mosaic (as defined by the virologists, NOT as defined by the silliness here) and rose rosette. Period. We're done now. If/when some other viral disease becomes important to us, horticulturally, maybe we'll look at that then. But at the moment, I think I'll go back to worrying about catching ebola from a chihuahua.

The University of California at Davis on the subject of rose diseases - link below.

I quote from it:

"For homeowners the problem largely is unsightly foliage, with possible decreased plant vigor and smaller and/or fewer flowers."

I would submit that here on the Rose Forums, we gardeners and exhibitors alike probably SHARE the common ground of concern about precisely these issues. After all, roses are relatively expensive and require years to mature and perform at their best.

Thank goodness for reputable nurseries. They are OUR first and best line of defense. Hopefully, they remain well informed, vigilant, and proactive.

My thanks to UC-Davis for the lnked material.

Here is a link that might be useful: Roses: Diseases and Abiotic Disorders

This post was edited by sandandsun on Mon, Apr 28, 14 at 13:38

Wow, what timing, a U.S. rose virus distribution study has just been published (April 14, 2014).

An April 14, 2014 reviewed published scientific paper concerning roses and Blackberry chlorotic ringspot virus(BCRV) reports the following:
Table 3. Geographic distribution of Blackberry chlorotic ringspot virus in rose showing virus-like symptoms

Cultivated roses: Alabama 0/5, North Carolina 0/10, Tennessee 9/11. Mississippi 0/3.

Wild roses: Arkansas 23/31, Iowa 0/9. Illinois 5/5. Missouri 10/10 in 2009 and 3/5 in 2010, and Oklahoma 0/10.

Thus a total of 45 roses were infected of the 99 examined.

On page 549 of the full paper they state the following:
"Survey for the occurrence of BCRV was conducted on 99 randomly collected wild or cultivated rose plants from nine states (Table 3). The virus was detected in samples from Arkansas, Missouri, Illinois, and Tennessee on approximately 30 and 58% of cultivated and wild rose samples, respectively."

This is what I had on the subject prior to the publication of this paper:

http://home.roadrunner.com/~kuska/Blackberry%20chlorotic%20ringspot%20virus%20(BCRV).htm

Here is a link that might be useful: April 14 , 2014 abstract (I have a copy of the full paper)

I have a question. Some of the roses on the list have this designation while others don't. What determines why a rose is selected to have this testing done? Could it be that it is more suspect of having it?

Prairiemoon2, you can read all about the program, and its history on the UC Davis website at the link below. Click on the link for the Rose Program Brochure for that. See the List of FPS Disease-Tested Rose Selections for the roses UC Davis has indexed. Many specialist rose nurseries across the country have taken the time to buy clean stock from UC Davis (see the price list, also at the link below, which seems pretty reasonable btw). Not all of them tell their customers which of their roses, if any, went through the UC Davis program. IMHO this is partly due to their not wanting customers to wonder about their other roses.

I haven't read through all of this again today, but somewhere among the UC Davis pages I think they mention the cost. The last time I found that info seems it was around $2,000 per rose. Not something everyone can afford, but once it is done, its done. Some of those using this service appear to be big companies with the cash, and often the ones who hold the patents on particular plants. So it wouldn't be surprising if many of the varieties tested were those that still were under patent at the time of testing and also roses that sold well.

Melissa

Here is a link that might be useful: UC Davis Foundation Plant Services

Duplicate deleted.

Melissa

This post was edited by Tessiess on Tue, Apr 29, 14 at 23:40

Melissa, that makes a lot of sense. Imagine that it costs that much for one rose. Thanks for the link as well. :-)

Man, if that name appears on a thread I instantly click the back button grrr. Who can be bothered reading all that cr@p.

Additional information about BCRV with pictures.

"A survey of several isolates collected from blackberry and rose across the United States revealed minimal diversity between isolates, although the New World population of the virus is very different from the only European isolate sequenced (87). The virus is widespread in the eastern part of the United States, especially among wild roses where the vast majority of the samples tested were infected with the virus. Given that there are several reports of thrips and bees transmitting ilarviruses as a function of moving pollen from infected to healthy plants (11,105), the wild rose population may be a significant reservoir of the virus.
As seed is another means of transmission of ilarviruses, several hundred seeds from rose, blackberry, and herbaceous plants were tested, and the virus was found to be transmitted at high rates (87). The virus was found to be the second most widespread virus in BYVD-affected plants and has been identified in Arkansas, Florida, North and South Carolina, Missouri, Oklahoma, and Oregon (I. E. Tzanetakis, S.W. Scott, B. Poudel, unpublished).

Title: "Viruses and Virus Diseases of Rubus"

Authors: "Robert R. Martin (1), Stuart MacFarlane (2), Sead Sabanadzovic(3), Diego Quito(4), Bindu Poudel(5), and Ioannis E. Tzanetakis(5)"

Authors affiliation:
(1) USDA-ARS Norticultural Crops Research Laboratory, Corvallis, OR.
(2) The James Hutton Institute, Invergowrie, Dundee, Scotland.
(3) Department of Biochemistry, Molecular Biology, Entomology and Plant Pathology, Mississippi State University, Mississippi State.
(4) Centro de Investgaciones Biotecnologicas del Ecuador, Guayaquil.
(5) Department of Plant Pathology, Division of Agriculture, University of Arkansas, Fayetteville.

Published in: Plant Disease, volumn 97, pages 168-182, ( 2013).

Here is a link that might be useful: link to full paper with above quote

A description of the Davis program is at:

http://fpms.ucdavis.edu/WebSitePDFs/Newsletters&Publications/RoseProgramBrochure.pdf

Unfortunately, it is a January 2004 description. From personal e-mails, I interpret that there have been what I consider major changes. I hope that a revision is being planned as I feel that so much has changed since then.

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The most recent description of Dr. Manners' program that I could find appears in the following:

Aug 2013 Rose Letter - The Heritage Roses Group

http://www.theheritagerosesgroup.org/public-newsletters/2013-august-hrg-rose-letter.pdf