HILO — The banana plants ringing Doug Van Scyoc’s chili pepper farm in Hilo had been thriving for about 30 years when, about a year ago, something happened to them. HILO — The banana plants ringing Doug Van Scyoc’s chili
HILO — The banana plants ringing Doug Van Scyoc’s chili pepper farm in Hilo had been thriving for about 30 years when, about a year ago, something happened to them.
The leaves of the plants began growing strangely and began looking sickly. Bunches of fruit, if there was any, would be stunted in growth. It was an obvious sign that the bananas had become infected with bunchy top disease.
The banana bunchy top virus, which is responsible for the disease, is not a new phenomenon. Since its discovery on Oahu in 1989, it has spread to most of the major Hawaiian Islands, except Lanai, and is prominent in Kona, Puna and gradually, Hilo.
Yet there are still areas on this island where the disease has not taken hold. And with the short-staffed Department of Agriculture unable to police the island for new signs of infestation, the onus is on farmers and neighbors to slow its spread into pristine areas.
The disease is spread by the banana aphid, a winged insect. Van Scyoc said he didn’t import his trees from infected areas. But because bananas are not his main source of income, he paid little attention to it. The Department of Agriculture got wind of the trees and gave Van Scyoc a brochure on the disease, but being busy, he didn’t read it.
Several concerned banana growers notified the Tribune-Herald and Kyle Onuma, noxious weed specialist with the Department of Agriculture.
“The virus is in Puna where we can manage it as long as we can police our neighborhoods and wild areas surrounding our farms,” one grower wrote in an email to the newspaper. “If the disease gets a foothold in Hilo, it will then move up the coast and into the gulches, and we’ll lose the ability to grow bananas there.”
With the help of Onuma, Van Syoc washed the plants with pesticide to kill the aphids and injected the herbicide Roundup into the plants. That will kill the banana plants eventually, after which Onuma’s department will haul away the dead vegetation. The Big Island Peppers farm is located about a block away from the Hawaii Community College campus.
“(Onuma) said he would help me clean it up,” Van Syoc said. “I really appreciate the fact that they’re doing this.”
“I’ve noticed this is more common in the Hilo area,” Onuma said. “It was found recently in Kona, and it spread to Kohala. … It’s pretty widespread on the island of Hawaii.”
But there are still areas where the disease hasn’t spread.
“I haven’t heard of any reports in the Pahala-Naalehu area, and Ocean View,” he said. Waimea, Honokaa and north of the Wailuku River in Hilo also appear to be disease-free.
Hamakua Springs Country Farms lost an entire banana plantation to the disease. In 2004, the company had 250 acres of Williams bananas in Puna under cultivation when owner Richard Ha discovered an infestation. So he closed the farm and had the plants bulldozed.
“We did a pretty good job,” Ha said.
“Once it starts to spread, if you don’t take care of it, it’ll be a reserve to spread some more,” Ha said. “I know the Department of Ag doesn’t have the staff ” that they need to combat the virus.
