Cedar Apple Rust

At first glance it looked like little orange cheerleader pompoms hanging on a couple of my Eastern red cedar trees, but it turned out to be gelatinous masses of fungus. The fungus blooms from woody galls during periods of warm, wet spring conditions. This fungus on the cedar trees releases spores that are carried by the wind to infect apple trees. On the apple trees the spores produce bright yellow-orange leaf lesions which create spores that are carried to cedar trees to complete the cycle. Cedar apple rust cycle takes 24 months to complete and requires infection of two different hosts.



The “squid-like tentacles” of fungus blooming from a cedar gall.



A cedar gall a day after a fungus bloom.



An old, dried up cedar gall.