COURTESY STATE DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE This banana plant has banana bunchy top virus, a serious disease. The virus has now been found in Panaewa on the Big Island.

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Banana virus is
found near Hilo

State officials ask growers to be
vigilant to help stop the spread

HILO » A devastating banana virus has spread to the outskirts of Hilo, and state agricultural officials are asking banana growers to be vigilant in an effort to stop the disease from spreading further.

Banana bunchy top virus has been found in Panaewa on the Big Island, near the rain-forest zoo, officials said.

"That's about the farthest north it has been found," said Nilton Matayoshi, of the state Department of Agriculture's Plant Pest Control Branch.

The virus, which deforms fruit and eventually ends new growth, was found in Keeau in 2004. It was also discovered in neighborhoods north of Hilo last year on three residential properties in the Halaula, Kapaau and Hawi areas in Kohala. State inspectors said last year that they believe the virus had been present in the Kohala area's backyard plants for several years.

Banana bunchy top was first observed in Hawaii in 1989 and is widely established on Oahu. It has since spread across the island chain -- discovered on the Big Island in 1995 and on Kauai in 1997. It was found for the first time on Maui at the beginning of 2003.

Early symptoms of banana bunchy top, which is spread by aphids, include streaking on leaf veins and stems. Severely infected plants usually will not bear fruit. The virus causes new leaves on mature plants to become narrower and causes the leaves to become bunched at the top.

Control is the only way to check the spread of the disease, officials said.

"Once banana bunchy top is established in the wild, it's virtually impossible to eradicate," Matayoshi said.

The federal government, through the Pacific Basin Agricultural Research Center in Hilo, provided $100,000 to the University of Hawaii for research on the disease in each of the last two years.