Jakki, I tried to find information on how long HVX will survive on uncleaned tools and couldn't find, but I do seem to recall it was well beyond 24 hours. If the spade made contact with the roots of the diseased plant -kinda hard to avoid in the procedure I'd say- it will have come in contact with the diseased plant's sap. As you know, the virus lives in the sap. The first thing to do when cleaning tools that have come into contact with HVX is to remove all traces of the sap and clean the tool before disinfecting it. Your spade was not cleaned, likely still had HVX in the remaining plant sap on it. For HVX to be transfered the virus laden plant sap has to come into contact with more plant sap through injured roots or crowns on another Hosta. As long as your other party didn't disturb any Hosta roots in the other bed you're fine, but it doesn't sound that way to me....

Pieter

HVX is very stable outside the plant and can survive up to 3 weeks on uncleaned tools.

Hopefully it wasn't used on any other hostas.

Chris

Thanks for that information - it's pretty heart-stopping!

Thankfully the spade was not used on other hostas!

We are all aware of the need to identify virused plants, and the need to clean tools, but I think the underlying reasons sometimes get lost in the cascade of information we have to take in.

I appreciate all of you whose knowledge is so much broader and deeper than mine, and for your willingness to share it freely with us. I am constantly amazed by the wonderful people I've met, in person, on-line and on the phone since my hosta obession began! It is a pleasure to me!

Jakki

Wow, that is eye opening. A good idea to educate spouses or other family members if they help in the garden. Good thing my husband insist I have my own spade (I tend to leave it wherever I dug last - lol).
Pam

Good grief! I had no idea that it could survive that long on tools. Thanks for the info!

Tracy

I've always stuck my garden tools in a 5-gallon bucket of bleach-water (about 25% bleach from the bottle & 75% water) for an hour or so after using them, and then spray them off with a high-powered hose. It's kept me from getting anything, except for the one instance of HVX. When I took that plant out, I used a completely different shovel that I don't use in my garden (it's an old utitlity shovel that doesn't really get used at all), SCRUBBED it with straight bleach & put it aside & haven't used it since. Same with the wheel-borrow I used to remove that one.

It's scary to see all the HVX issues, but common sense seems to be the biggest prevention.

I am fascinated that HVX can "live" on a tool that long- but reportedly does not live in the soil where the plant was dug from....

Some things just make you go Hmmmmm...

As far as HVX goes, I believe it is knowledge shared and a persistent vigilance combined with patience that will help stop the spread of this dx.

Short of testing your hosta- there is no way to know if your plants are infected- until they show sign possibly MANY years down the road.

I had the nicest looking Striptease purchased at a local highbrow nursery many years ago- struck down in it's prime a few years back. I really do not want that to happen again. One heartache was bad enough.

Here's hoping we can all do our part to stop this dx from spreading!

Julie

dont you guys own more than one shovel???

use one for the bad deed... clean it after.. leave it in the sun for a few days .... and put it away.. for the next time .... or for gravel.. or whatever things you might do that dont involve hosta ....

for a $20 investment... you can have a shovel you dont have to worry about ... actually how much is a once a year shovel going for these days ....

seriously.. do you only have one shovel???

ken

aw, Ken... a voice from the other side of age-related brain damage...

I've got a jug of engine coolant in the garage. It is open. When you use engine coolant, it is mixed 50-50 with water... but, of course, when you need it and open a new jug, the stuff in the jug is undiluted... and can't be diluted to the correct amount until that jug is half-empty.

And, of course, this always happens when you are leaving for a trip or going to a funeral or getting married or something, so you pour some into the reservoir and then dump in some water, shooting for about 50-50. You also don't have an indelible pen (or any writing implement)in your pocket, so you promise yourself you will remember and head off to your great aunt's bat mitzvah... and promptly forget until the next time you need engine coolant.

I've got four sprayers so I can use one for really bad kill-everything herbicides and one for Round-up and the other two for whatever... and you'd think I could keep straight which was which... and you'd think that I'd immediately mark them with an indelible (I first typed inedible - that too...)pen, but every year I have to go through the "now which was this again???" two-step.

I think I have 8 shovels. Short of painting one with a black skull and crossbones, there is no way this old brain of mine is going to keep a specific "shovel of death" tucked away in the shed. Add to that that I have a co-Idiot gardener... I think we'd better concentrate on cleaning up!

My surprise isn't that it lasts that long on a dirty shovel, but that it doesn't last longer. I have read that you shouldn't plant in the same spot for a year. I assume that means it is in the soil nearly that long. I would think it would be live in the soil on the shovel for a while too, tho less than a year.

Ken, Please correct me if I am wrong, but I am concerned about the statement:

"use one for the bad deed... clean it after.. leave it in the sun for a few days .... and put it away.. for the next time .... or for gravel.. or whatever things you might do that dont involve hosta."

Other gardening may be in that category. I probably have more invested in my other perennial gardens than hosta gardens. I have read that the HVX can be transferred to other types of plants. True or false?
gramma jan

hey idiot ....

go to the dollar store.. buy a can of orange paint...

hit the hvx shovel ...

and the killer sprayer ...

with international orange..

actually i have landscape paint.. the can that shoots upside down.. for marking new beds... and i use it on a multitude of projects..

in fact.. do the back of your left hand.. NEXT TIME YOU WANT TO REMEMBER SOMETHING ... lol... or your left shoe..

or if you prefer.. your right shoe ... you can even shoot the antifreeze tank.. the one that will always be 50% ...

whatever ...

g-ma ... we dont care about hvx in other plants ... just as we dont care that variegated columbine are such because they have a virus... or that hackberry trees carry a virus.. or that most ferns carry either a virus or nem's ....

A LOT OF VARIEGATION IN THE PLANT WORLD IS RELATED TO VIRUS ....

we ID a SPECIFIC virus.. on a SPECIFIC plant.. and take appropriate or SPECIFIC action therein ...

its like the nem debate in heyJ post ... there are billions of types of nems in the world... ONLY ONE CONCERNS US .. in hostadom ...hopefully only one .. lol ...

ken

ps: idiot.. maybe you could dab the steering wheel with the paint.. so you can get the radiator fixed.. so you dont need to keep adding antifreeze ... lol ..

Thanks, Ken... I've got stuff with paint marks... green, red, yellow... maybe you can come over and find the index in my stacks of stuff... can't remember for sure if it is green for "go" or green for "Kills all that is green..."

Have had good luck matching toenail polish on my big toes to color dabs in the shoes... Lavender for Left, Red for Right...

so far, so good!

you're a hoot idiot.. lol

g-ma... to specifically answer this ???: HVX can be transferred to other types of plants.

[H]osta [V]irus [X] .... note the caps... should have no effect on other plants.. its specific to HOSTA ....

and i will believe such until i am told otherwise ...

i was told [presumably by someone who knows this stuff .. dr dave??? can you help here???].. to not think of the word VIRUS.. as you might think of yourself catching a flu virus ... a plant other than a hosta ... can not 'catch' the hosta virus ...

i believe i asked.. why if we can 'cure' a virus in a human.. why we cant cure a plant virus .... something along those lines ... that is when i was disabused of my notions of 'virus' ....

and i will leave it at that.. we would have to get a scientist involved .. and at that point.. all of ours eyes would glaze over.. and somewhere into hour two of an explanation that we didnt understand anything after the third word .... we would kill each other .... and start wondering.. [perhaps not in that order] .. why we even cared to ask the question in the first place ... rotflmbo ...

ken