Powdery Mildew Citizen Science Survey, UK, 2013-2015

Quality Control

The dataset has been checked using the NBN Record Cleaner.

Method steps

1. Samples of this fungal plant disease were collected with their host plants randomly by members of the public. Samples were sent by post to the project convenor at the University of Reading, funded by the Royal Horticultural Society, who identified the different powdery mildew species. Powdery mildews are traditionally identified using a combination of their appearance and the identification of their host plant. Some plants have only one known powdery mildew so identification of the host allows an immediate tentative identification of the pathogen, while others have several known mildew pathogens. Using a light microscope morphological features of the mildew must be found and the mildew can then be identified using a key and by comparison with published images. In many cases these features can be difficult to distinguish between species or can only be found at a certain stage of the life cycle of the fungus. Molecular DNA extraction and sequencing then completes the process as sequences are matched to a database of known powdery mildews.

The samples cover the UK. It is likely that there is a bias to samples in the Berkshire and Liverpool area as major contributors reside in these areas. The majority of records in this dataset are collated with exact GPS locations.