Peltaster fructicola: A New Species in the Complex of Fungi Causing Apple Sooty Blotch Disease

Peltaster fructicola sp. nov., associated with sooty blotch disease of apple fruit (Malus x domestica) in North Carolina, is described. The fungus produces dark, irregular shaped colonies with pycnothyria on the surface of apple fruit. Pycnothyria of P. fructicola were 81–113 μm in diameter; conidia were borne on an inverted hymenium and were produced in a single locule formed by the separation of the dimidiate shield from the surface of the apple. Pycnothyria did not possess a defined ostiole but opened by fissures along the surface of the shield. Paraphyses were not observed. P. fructicola produced conidia directly from hyphae immersed within a water agar medium, but no pycnothyria were formed.