Constantine Brown

Rust of a Thousand Faces - Myrtle Rust - Austropuccinia psidii

Constantine Brown

I’m personally rather fond of globalization. It's benefitted me in a variety of ways. In cold Northern winters I can warm up with chai tea with cinnamon and allspice while I read books written across continents. My oil painting kit has turpentine for brush cleaner, shipped from chemical plants processing the raw tropical materials. My cough drops are made in Switzerland with Australian eucalyptus. The global food market down the street calls out the price of fresh guava, sold in Ohio of all places. This is all pure, unthinkable luxury.

Like our interconnected, interdependent modern world, the luxuries of fresh tropical juices and oil paintings are closer related than they seem. These global products have nothing in common- except that they are all based on Myrtles. You see, humanity wasn't the first species to globalize. Ancient relatives of the myrtle tree spread across the world of Pangaea, and so in the modern world they are found on multiple continents. It's a small world. These varied, useful plants are cousins. My much-beloved commercial products, as well as many global ecosystems, depend on the continued survival of the related species of Myrtle. In the year 1884, their survival was tested by an emerging threat. The story of Myrtle Rust begins here, with a remote worker and an envelope to Europe. 

Europe cared little for Brazilian Myrtles and their ancestral tenders beyond profit from the colonies. The first curious European to notice this novel disease of a foreign tree was one Georg Winter. Dr. Georg Winter worked remotely. He enjoyed traveling, but due to “domestic affairs”, the details of which I have been unable to acquire (that 19th century privacy…), Winter was forced to return to his hometown of Leipzig in 1883. He made his publications and discoveries through mail correspondence with nearly every mycologist of his day. By the 80’s (the 1880’s, that is), his collection of assorted fungi, Fungi Europsei et Extra-Europcei, was the third largest in the world. A kind and deeply enthusiastic man, Winter had many friends, and begged them all to send him dried mycological samples for his “exsiccata”, or dried samples, collection.

Some of these friends lived in the Americas, and Winter soon became an expert in fungi from outside of Europe. A particular friend sent a carefully packed envelope, delivered by transatlantic cargo ship and horse-drawn carriage from Brazilian jungle to urban Germany. Dr. Winter must have been thrilled after the long wait to finally see the South American fungi that had never previously stepped ashore of Europe. He was still tied down in “domestic matters” in Germany, and may never have personally stepped foot in Brazil! (Kellerman, 1887) The bright yellow spore spots, paled from the long journey. Once-fresh Guava leaves, dried and dusty. He could tell that it was a rust, but without live observation in its native environment, Dr. Winter could only mark it down as a new species. In 1884, he described Guava Rust in his journal Hedivigici Rabenhorst.  1884- rust of Guava- found on Psidium pomiferum- observed in Brazil. (Winter, 1884)

These egg-yolk yellow spots on the dead leaves were pustules full of a type of spore called a urediniospore. If Dr. Winter could fly to Brazil on a modern trans-atlantic flight (as I'm sure he would love to) he would see spots of yellow scattered amongst the jungle green everywhere he looked. The wind picks up, rustles the dense foliage, and invisibly carries a urediniospore to a healthy tree. What happens after it lands? 

These jungle plants have tiny pores to allow chemical and gas exchange, but invaders like the Myrtle Rust can slip in through the cracks. Only 2 to 4 days after the urediniospore lands, it germinates and enters the inside of the leaf through non-destructive means. This is a very short latency period for a fungus. After 10 to 12 days a deep yellow tone begins to spread across the under-side of the leaves, individual urediniospores visible with Dr. Winter’s microscope. Fine yellow pustule spots appear on the leaves, flowers, buds, stems, and fruits. (Glen et al., 2007) The circles of infection increase in size until they connect together across the leaf. Some days later, the pustles erupt out to release more urediniospores to the wind.  (Ferreira, 1984)

While this process is usually completed within a few weeks, the pathogen can “sit and wait” in a host for 4-6 weeks before symptoms are visible, if conditions aren’t ideal for infection. (Carnegie and Lidbetter, 2012)

The disease progresses. Symptoms vary depending on the host, but most species show a similar pattern. The yellow ruptures creep across the leaf, surrounded by purple stains like bruises. Leaves shrivel and die. The Guava fruit became dessicated, mummified while still on the branch. (Glen et al., 2007; Tommerup et al., 2003) Brazilian farmers suffered 80-100% loss of their crop. (Ribeiro and Pommer, 2004) The diseased tissue became necrotic and fell to the forest floor. The Guava farmers simply left the dead leaves to rot into the soil. I’m sure they thought “What good is sweeping the ground of your orchard when you’re already ruined?”. Quite a lot of good, in fact. The fungal spores can survive for months on the piles of rotting leaves, re-infecting the orchard every year that the leaf piles remain.

The visible yellow wounds, bane of any Brazilian orchardist, are only a small part of the fungus. Urediniospores are just the reproductive cells of the rust. The rest of the fungal cells hidden inside of the plant parasitize water and sugars throughout their lifecycle. Plant pathologists call the ability to parasitize living cells biotrophy, and this fungus is a biotroph. A biotrophic pathogen does not need to kill the host in order to live. The pathogen may even “want” the host to live as long as possible. (All the better to parasitize you, my dear...) The plant fights back by cutting off the parasite. If the plant can’t have living cells, then neither can the pathogen. The plants kills the cells around the biotroph. This plant immune process is called the Hypersensitive Response. In humans, fever is our own bodies’ attempt to become unlivable conditions for an invader, by making itself unlivable conditions for anyone- including ourselves. The Guava tree is killing its own leaves in a similar reaction (or overreaction) to the fungus.

If the pathogen is too virulent, or the tree is too weak, the gambit fails. The fungus eliminates the tree’s ability to produce new growth. Eventually the entire tree is as dusty as Georg Winter’s specimens shipped across the Atlantic. 

Though the Europeans paid no mind to novel Brazilian diseases, they loved novel Brazilian commercial goods. Transatlantic commerce increased throughout the 19th century. European investors capitalized on the demand for tropical goods by founding plantations in the rainforests of South America. In nature, many different species live together in the forests of Brazil. The hopeful European colonists seeking profit from Eucalyptus timber (and Guava, and Allspice…) cut down other, “undesirable” species to make room for a monoculture of the highest possible economic value. This sort of short term planning is risky business. Human activity can increase the spread of fungal diseases. Logging degrades the landscape which weakens native trees. The closely-planted plantation monoculture is ideal territory for the fungus. Monoculture enables the spread of the rust through the long-range wind-blown urediniospores. The spores hop from non-native tree to non-native tree, and from there to the weakened native trees. The rust kills the Eucalyptus, but humanity let it kill the native jungle. 

Myrtle Rust was first observed on Eucalyptus in 1912 (and later formally described in 1944  (Jollify, 1944)), displaying the classic yellow calling card on the dead leaves. The pale yellow dust coating the eucalyptus and guava leaves can coat other things as well on long voyages. A longshoreman packs crates of lumber into a cargo hold. The spores cling to the sap. On the next voyage, that same cargo hold is packed with sugarcane from Jamaica. Another longshoreman takes his shore leave, spores clinging invisibly to his boots, treading soil naive to the rust. By 1934, Myrtle Rust had spread to the Jamaican allspice industry and decimated the crop. (Burnett and Schubert, 1985)

Myrtle Rust has a notable reliance on these yellow urediniospores for its spread. Let’s take our eye from the microscope for a moment and look at the bigger picture. Rusts are an entire category of fungus, and they tend to have five different types of spores that they produce over a complex lifecycle involving multiple different host species. Myrtle Rust can produce all five different types of spores, but in the wild it usually only makes urediniospores. Perhaps it doesn’t need to make the others, because the asexual urediniospores suffice? Myrtle Rust is currently believed to be autoecious, which means that it only needs a single host species to complete its entire lifecycle. (Glen et al., 2007) There isn’t currently any evidence for any alternate host for Myrtle Rust. Perhaps it doesn't need another host, because it uses so many different myrtle species instead? The complexities of the rust are as of yet, unknown. The lifecycle remains remarkably straightforward compared to other rust fungi.

Myrtle Rust may not use multiple different spore types in the wild, but it does have multiple ways to spread. The hyphal strands of fungus can lie invisibly dormant inside of myrtle saplings until conditions are right. If a human being digs up and moves the infected plant to a better environment, the fungus can suddenly activate. Brazilian farmers once again learned about Myrtle Rust the hard way. Timber plantations in Brazil commonly purchased Eucalyptus saplings grown in Africa to finish in Brazil. A strange idea, planting the seed across the ocean from where you eventually plant the tree, but it made financial sense for the lumber companies. Depending on an overseas third party supplier can make sense, but it can also backfire. The year was 1973. Warm and rainy nights in the Brazilian state of Espirito Santo heralded the coming of catastrophe. (Blum and Dianese, 2001; Carnegie et al., 2022) The entire crop of 400,000 Eucalyptus grandis seedlings, imported from a South African plantation, was infected with the rust. Espirito Santo farmers saw the yellow spores and knew they were already ruined, and that their sickly saplings would never grow to full size. (Ferreira, 1981) These repeated disasters inspired Brazilian resistance breeding efforts. (Ribeiro and Pommer, 2004) The financial devastation wrought in Espirito Santo also inspired a change of name- no more would it be called Guava Rust, but instead Eucalyptus Rust. We’ll see how long this name sticks, shall we? 

As the name changes, the nature of the disease changes with it. Not all Myrtle Rusts are made equally, and this isn’t quite the same rust as back in 1884. Its time spent in Africa around ever-so-slightly different cultivars of Eucalyptus has increased the diversity of host species it can infect. The rust is evolving to thrive in its environment, and if that environment is diverse varieties of Eucalyptus, the rust population will gradually improve at infecting diverse varieties. A traveling pathogen can return to its hometown, now with a broader range of possible hosts. The reintroduction of a pathogen as a novel variety (or race, as mycologists call it) can be worse than the original type. What does it mean to cure a disease, when every cargo hold could carry a new race of an old fungus packed in with bolts of cloth and foreign fruits? How can we possibly respond to such a nebulous threat?

We could imagine a nation with an absolute terror of fungal pathogens, and an absolute anti-fungal monarch. Our hypothetical nation could inspect every leaf and seed entering the country and scrub off the boots of travelers before they step off the plane. Myrtle Rust can disperse over distances of hundreds of kilometers using windblown spores, so every neighboring country would have to be forced to burn their infected myrtles. Even further distances are possible traveling as a passenger on human beings, equipment, vehicles, nursery stock, and transported goods. Our anti-fungal tyrant would implement strict border searches. The animals that depend on fruits made by myrtles can inadvertently contribute to the spread of the rust on their fur and feathers (Carnegie et al., 2010), but if there are no infected trees, wildlife can’t spread the infection. The citizens cheer. Finally, we can live in peace from blight. Finally, we’ve cut off every entry point for pathogens. Unfortunately, their cheers are premature. There is one pathogen entry point that cannot be cut off, no matter the effort expended. Cross-oceanic trade winds can carry spores across continents and oceans. The eventual entry of a pathogen is inevitable.

While our hypothetical anti-fungal tyranny over a perfectly enclosed country is impossible, restricting the import of plants can still help control the risk of disease. Hawaii has imposed quarantine against myrtle shipments since the early 2000s. The state government of Hawaii watched the spread of Myrtle Rust across the Caribbean and Pacific with concern. Ohi’a trees fill their beautiful island forests… but unfortunately, Ohi’a is a Myrtle. (Killgore and Heu, 2007) Island ecosystems are threatened by invasive species, as the Hawaiians already knew. The forests are not only filled with native myrtle Ohi’a, but also the myrtle Rose-apple. Rose-Apple is, like the timber plantations of Brazil, not part of the native forests of Hawaii. 

The Hawaiian government’s quarantines failed to keep out the Rose-apple. So too did they fail to keep out the Myrtle Rust. Now Hawaiian forests of Ohi’a faced not only competition from Rose-apple, but also disease from the rust. As the war between the rust, Ohi’a, and Rose-apple raged on, it soon became clear that invasive Rose-apple was more susceptible to the rust than Ohi’a. It dies out first. My first instinct upon hearing this was to cheer for the Myrtle Rust, wiping away the scourge of Hawaiian biodiversity, clearing a path for the new! On a second look, this is not quite so simple a story. If the rust infects every Rose-apple in Hawaii, it will have so many hosts that new pathogen races will develop. A new race could develop that is more effective against the Ohi’a. (Cannon et al., 2022) Landfall of the rust on Hawaiian shores could lead to disaster for native biodiversity. Like the people of the Amazon, native Hawaiians had no recourse against the industrialization of their forests, and continue to face consequences to this day. If the invasive Rose-apple had not already spread in their damaged forests, the Myrtle Rust would not have an easy host on the islands, and perhaps the resistant Ohi’a could be saved. At this point in our history, the rust bears that name Eucalyptus Rust after its previous destruction of timber plantations. Surely the destruction of Hawaiian forests is a suitably grand feat to earn a rechristening, and so Eucalyptus Rust became Ohi’a Rust.

By 2006 our intrepid rust had already infected dozens of different hosts, from Guava and Eucalyptus, to Allspice and Rose-Apple. Myrtle Rust is strangely, distinctively generalist in its hosts. Most rust pathogens can only infect a scant few closely related species at most. The possible host species of Myrtle Rust vary wildly across many genera of the order of Myrtles. (Coutinho et al., 1998) An “Order” is a broad taxonomic category of related plants. Apples and roses, as distantly related as they may seem, are both in the order Rosacea. Every possible host of Myrtle Rust, as diversely-related as apples and roses, are in the order Myrtaceae. The question of “How, and why, is this specific pathogen so hyperdiverse?” remains to be answered.

In Australia, the protagonist of our moldering tale finally gains its modern name of Myrtle Rust, and not a moment too soon. Here, 2250 species of Myrtles are potentially threatened by the disease. (Makinson and Conn, 2014) Myrtle rust was first detected (as Uredo rangelii) in Australia in 2010 (Carnegie et al., 2010). Bob Makinson, self-identified Communist, folk-music aficionado, and peace activist, was president of the Australian Network for Plant Conservation at the time. He soon found himself with a new war on his doorstep. 

Southwestern Australian rangers had found Myrtle Rust infecting wild bush myrtles across a broad area. It was already too late for a national-level quarantine, but perhaps individual regions in Australia could avoid the scourge. People would unwittingly spread the spores if they weren’t warned, so Makinson established a workshop program for local growers and Indigenous groups to learn about the threat of the rust. Like Georg Winter, he knew the value of a good mycological network. 

Bob Makinson is an old-school plant pathologist. I’m sure that as he watched the multiplying reports of disease sightings, he thought about Coffee Rust, Chestnut Blight, Dutch Elm Disease, and the many other fungal diseases that can cause tree extirpations (local extinctions) and global extinctions. 15 rainforest trees are at risk of extinction from Myrtle Rust in Australia so far (DCCEEW, 2022), and the Australian government wants to avoid making a new entry in national extinction-causing fungal diseases. They set Makinson on the case for a solution. Bob Makinson (and his horde of interns and associates) finalized the Myrtle Rust National Action Plan in 2020 with recommendations for research efforts, quarantines, education campaigns, and plans for future fungicide applications and resistance breeding. (Makinson et al., 2020) Despite the containment effort, eradication in Australia has already been declared impossible. (DCCEEW, 2022)

We try to control the natural world. It never quite works out the way we expect. People throughout history have been willing to cut down forests to grow more of the products that Western world depends on. For myrtles we plant eucalyptus, turpentine, guava, allspice, tea tree, and others.  The delicate tropical forest ecosystems we uproot have people who depend on them as they are, not as is most profitable for plantation owners. We attempt to control the natural world by optimizing for specific resources, but genetic diversity is a valuable resource in its own right.  Tropical regions contain a large, but difficult to quantify percentage of all biodiversity on Planet Earth. (Pillay et al., 2021) They are essential carbon sinks and mitigate the worst atmospheric effects of climate change. Biodiversity loss from human activity and plant pathogens can start a vicious, spiraling cycle: a few generalist species dominate a degraded tropical ecosystem, and the fungus spreads like biological wildfire among the too-close, too-closely-related trees. After the fungus has killed every susceptible species, even fewer species remain in the ecosystem, ripe pickings for another threat. We can simplify and “optimize” only until disaster strikes. More than just agricultural loss, Myrtle Rust threatens to collapse entire fragilized ecosystems.

This is an immediate fungal threat, not one far in the past. The situation is still evolving. Myrtle Rust has a foothold on every susceptible continent. Our usual attempts to find resistant varieties are unlikely to succeed against the Myrtle Rust’s extreme generalism. The scope of the problem has grown too large to manage through fungicide alone. We now pin our hopes on novel technologies and breakthroughs. We don’t yet know whether Brazil’s resistance breeding, Hawaii’s quarantines, and Australia’s national effort will succeed. In the modern world of trade and travel, the rise of fungal pandemics may be inevitable. The very interconnections that make our world can let problems spread, and our modern degradation of nature allows these problems to take root. We see a rise in human pandemics for the same reasons. Globalization, global trade, industry, and travel change the nature of connection- and the nature of disaster. Though the future of Myrtles is uncertain, I hope we can conserve Eucalyptus. We’ll need it for all the cough drops.

Bibliography

Blum L. E. B., and J. C. Dianese. (2001).  Patterns of urediniospores release and development of rose apple rust. Pesquisa Agropecuaria Brasileira 36: 845–850.

Burnett, H, and T Schubert. 1985. PUCCINIA PSIDII on ALLSPICE and RELATED PLANTS. Plant Pathology Circular No. 271 

Cannon, Philip G, et al. (2022). Determining If There Are Lines of Guava Rust (Puccinia Psidii) That Could Seriously Impact Ohia (Metrosideros Polymorpha), in Hawaii. Adams, J., Comp. Proceedings of the 57th Western International Forest Disease Work Conference; 2009 July 20-24; Durango, CO. Fort Collins, CO: Forest Health Technology Enterprise Team. P. 47-49., pp. 47–49, research.fs.usda.gov/treesearch/36994.

Carnegie, A. J., J. R. Lidbetter, J. Walker, M. A. Horwood, L. Tesoriero, M. Glen, and M. J. Priest. (2010). Uredo rangelii, a taxon in the guava rust complex, newly recorded on Myrtaceae in Australia. Australasian Plant Pathology, 39(5):463-466.

Carnegie, A. J. and J. R. Lidbetter.  (2012).  Rapidly expanding host range for Puccinia psidii sensu lato in Australia. Australasian Plant Pathology, 41(1):13-29. 

Carnegie, A. J., & Giblin, F. R. (2022). Austropuccinia psidii (myrtle rust). CABI Compendium, CABI Compendium. https://doi.org/10.1079/cabicompendium.45846. https://www.cabidigitallibrary.org/doi/full/10.1079/cabicompendium.45846

Coutinho, T. A., Wingfield, M. J., Alfenas, A. C., and Crous, P. W. (1998). Eucalyptus rust: A disease with the potential for serious international implications. Plant Dis. 82:819-825.

DCCEEW. (2022). Myrtle rust (Austropuccinia psidii). Dcceew.gov.au. https://www.dcceew.gov.au/environment/invasive-species/diseases-fungi-and-parasites/myrtle-rust

Ferreira, FA. (1981). Ferrugem do eucalipto ocorrencia, temperatura para geminatio de uredosporos produlfao de teliosporos, hospedeiro alternativo e resistencia. Fitopatologia Brassileira 6: 603–604.

Glen, M., A. C. Alfenas, E. A. V. Zauza, M. J. Wingfield and C. Mohammed. (2007).  Puccinia psidii: a threat to the Australian environment and economy – a review.  Australasian Plant Pathology, 36: 1-16.

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There exists a photo of me surrounded by buckets, hands completely coated in the slimy remnants of half-rotted fruit. I’m smiling widely and wearing a tidy and crisp uniform that isn’t quite so crisp anymore.

The fruit is Pawpaw, and I’m at the Ohio Pawpaw Festival. I’m running a seed drive for my Eagle Project with the Scouts BSA: I’m using the seeds for reforesting a cleared area of my local campground.

YMCA Camp Shiffer has an open area cleared of invasive species. My project is part of a long-term reforestation/ land reclaimation project, replanting the area with native hardwoods (1-2 years old), and shielding the trees against deer damage. I wanted to do an effective and responsible job of my project, so I consulted with local orchardists and nurseries, The Union County Soil and Water Conservation district, and my local forester with the Ohio Department of Natural Resources for their advice on biodiversity and forest conservation.

There have been some changes and setbacks in the project. Normally a warm fall is an enjoyable experience, but I was getting worried when it was the first week of December and we *still* hadn’t had a hard enough freeze for most of the trees to go dormant enough to plant.

But the first setback was figuring out what trees I was going to plant: slow-growing or fast-growing? Tall or short? Shade-loving or sun-loving? I made the choice to plant Pawpaw carefully. While in an ideal world, I could plant slow-growing high-value species (such as chestnut or oak) , learning more about the nature of native reforestation of damaged areas changed my mind.

This specific camp area had previously been infested with destructive levels of invasive honeysuckle growth, but had only recently been cleared for native reforestation. The honeysuckle would take over again if we didn’t get trees up, and fast. We planted Tulip poplar interplanted with slower growing understory trees such as native Pawpaw. In this way, the Tulip poplar shoots up in growth, preventing the establishment of invasive species, and in the process it shades the shade-loving Pawpaw tree.

All together, my team planted 100 Tulip Poplars, 50 Shadbush Serviceberries, 25 Wild Cherry trees, 1 Pawpaw sapling, and over 1000 Pawpaw seeds divided into sets of ten seeds each. Now that the area planted has native tree cover, invasive species will not be able to spread so rapidly. All of the deer protection we installed should (fingers crossed) keep the deer from harming the young trees. The fruit will support local wildlife and plantlife. Both the YMCA CEO and the camp property committee look forward to the aesthetic benefits of increased shade and flowering trees.

In total, the project was a great success. I have entrusted the caretaking of the budding young trees to Troop 87, the home troop of Camp Shiffer.

I’m interested in doing more projects like this in the future, especially since I learned so much!

A typical view of the site.

Propagating nursery of hardy native fruit trees founded in Central Ohio. I built every greenhouse by hand, and installed the irrigation line in the 3.5 acre orchard.

Director of Dan Beard Scout Reservation Ecology Center

For the past 4 years I've worked as Dan Beard Council Reservation NEST Ecology Center staff. I lead classes for youth ages 11 through 17 in varied fields of environmental science. Over the summer, I've taught classes in mycology, fisheries management, ornithology, forestry, and others. I report information about the environmental health of the property to the local rangers. I cull diseased elms in the local woodland and survey for invasive species across the Little Miami River Region. I manage radio training and emergency procedures for nine employees, six direct reports, and 60 youth. The NEST Center is also a natural science museum and I report inventory for the museum's collection. This past year I served as Director, which means I write the class syllabi, and directly manage the center itself.

Audio-visual technician for First Presbyterian

Accessibility infrastructure construction in Point Pleasant, West Virginia

Meals on Wheels food prep volunteer

In my life outside of environmental work, I participate extensively in educational historical re-enactment with the Society for Creative Anachronism.

I am a poet (I am currently editing a collection made up of work that I've written over the past 3 years to publish), a gardener, an avid reader, and a maker.
My most recent personal project was 3D printing a scale model of a moon lander.

On campus, I am also an active member in Buckeyes For Accessibility, which is the OSU Club representing the interests and activism of the Disabled community here. I'm studying GIS technology, specifically ARCGIS, in order to better help the Ecological Restoration Club with their work on campus. And just for fun, I play with the Board to Death board gaming club. It’s a great way to make new friends!

I've stayed connected with the communities I built in my high school years. I serve as an adult leader with my old BSA Scout troop, female Scout Troop 777. I organize educational, recreational, and volunteering opportunities for these young women. This winter, we went on a trip to the International Wolf Center to learn about the biology and ecosystem role of wolves.