Yellow vine disease is caused by the phytoplasma Flavescence doreée and is an extremely dangerous, incurable quarantine disease transmitted by a species of cicada. According to agronomist Roman Rachkov from the Bulgarian Association for Biological Plant Protection, the possible damage from yellow vine disease is significantly higher than the damage from phylloxera, which swept away European vineyards a century ago, writes BNR.
There are assumptions that the cicada was brought from North America during World War II, or even earlier, and its presence in Europe was established in France in 1950. In Bulgaria, the insect was first discovered in 2006.
Yellow vine disease is included in the lists for phytosanitary control of the European Union. Alas, the disease was recently established in Bulgaria, in a vineyard near Svishtov.