Peach Disease Research Articles

Effects of Bacillus fertilizer and agent on growth of young peach tree and soil environment under replant condition.

We analyzed the effects of Bacillus fertilizer and agent supplementation at different concentrations in the replanted soil by examining the growth of young peach trees, soil nutrients, enzyme activities, and fungal commu-nity. The aim of this study was to provide theoretical basis for alleviating peach replant diseases. One-year-old potted 'Yuanmeng' peach trees were subjected to eight treatments: replanted soil without supplementation (RS), non-replanted soil without supplementation (NS), replanted soil with 1%, 4%, 8% Bacillus fertilizer supplementation (BF1, BF2, BF3), and 0.1‰, 0.5‰, 1‰ Bacillus agent supplementation (B1, B2, B3), respectively. The results showed that shoot growth and root biomass under NS treatment were greater than that under other treatments, and the contents of soil organic matter, available nutrients and soil catalase activity were greatly enhanced. Peach trees treated with BF and B treatments showed better root development than RS, among which, BF3 and B1 treatments were the best, and B1 treatment had similar effects as NS treatment. Compared with RS, BF and B treatments significantly increased the activities of soil catalase and urease during new shoot development, while B treatment significantly increased soil sucrase activity after the growth cessation of new shoots. Bacillus fertilizer and agent increased soil fungal diversity and the relative abundance of Ascomycota, Chaetomium and Penicillium, and decreased that of Basidiomycota. Considering the comprehensive parameters, BF3 and B1 showed more significant effects. In summary, our findings indicated that the supplementation of Bacillus fertilizer and agent to replanted soil could improve soil fertility, fungal community, and root development of roots, and thus provided a feasible method to alleviate peach replant diseases.

Sensitivity of Colletotrichum nymphaeae to Six Fungicides and Characterization of Fludioxonil-Resistant Isolates in China.

Colletotrichum nymphaeae is the dominant species causing anthracnose disease of peach in China. In this study, 140 isolates of C. nymphaeae were assessed for their sensitivity to six fungicides. It was found that C. nymphaeae was highly resistant to carbendazim, procymidone, and boscalid but sensitive to pyraclostrobin and prochloraz. For fludioxonil, the fungus exhibited differential sensitivities (i.e., approximately 14% of isolates were resistant to fludioxonil and the resistance was stable). Fludioxonil-resistant isolates had a mean EC50 value of 2.2380 µg/ml, whereas the mean EC50 value was 0.0194 µg/ml in fludioxonil-sensitive isolates. The mean EC50 values of C. nymphaeae for pyraclostrobin and prochloraz were 0.0083 µg/ml and 0.002 µg/ml, respectively. No cross-resistance was observed between fungicides from different groups. Mycelial growth rate, control efficacy, and osmotic stress responses were significantly different (P < 0.05) between fludioxonil-sensitive (FluS) and -resistant (FluR) isolates, but no significant difference was observed (P > 0.05) in virulence and sporulation between FluS and FluR isolates. No mutation was detected in coding regions of the CnOs-1, Cal, Hk1, Hog1, TPI, and Mrr1 genes. Interestingly, with fludioxonil treatment, the expression of ABC transporter gene atrB was significantly overexpressed in some resistant isolates. However, overexpression of the atrB gene was not detected in one moderately and one highly resistant isolate, indicating that other unknown mechanisms may be involved. Current findings uncovered several effective chemicals and provided the foundation for designing management strategies to practically control peach anthracnose with the most effective demethylation inhibitor fungicides and quinone outside inhibitor fungicides.

Blossom blight resistance in peach: heritability and segregation in progenies from reciprocal crosses

Blossom blight and brown rot caused by Monilinia fructicola is the most important peach disease in Brazil. Genetic resistance is a control strategy that is gaining importance in breeding programs worldwide. This study aimed to identify genotypes with higher levels of blossom blight resistance to estimate the heritability of this character; study the frequency distribution in populations; and test the possibility of maternal effect. Blossom blight susceptibility was tested in reciprocal hybridizations seedlings, as well as their parents. The detached flower technique was used in a randomized complete block design, considering each genotype as a treatment. Flower inoculation was made by spraying a M. fructicola suspension and evaluations were carried out after 72 and 120 hours using a scale of five severity levels. The studied populations presented low phenotypic variability regarding the flower resistance/susceptibility to M. fructicola, being most of them susceptible or very susceptible. Among the tested genotypes, the cultivars Maciel and Cerrito showed less blossom blight susceptibility, transmitting this character to their progenies. Heritability estimates of the blossom blight resistance were medium to low. The low heritability and its distribution in the progenies suggest that the character has additive inheritance, without detecting deviations associated with maternal effects.

Recombinase Polymerase Amplification/Cas12a-Based Identification of Xanthomonas arboricola pv. pruni on Peach

Peach bacterial spot caused by Xanthomonas arboricola pv. pruni (Xap) is a devastating disease worldwide and frequently causes massive economic losses. In recent years, it has become a pandemic outbreak in most peach production areas of China, especially on precocious peaches in the middle reach of the Yangtze River. Rapid, user-friendly detection is extremely important to make the correct diagnosis and develop suitable control strategies. In this study, we described a recombinase polymerase amplification (RPA)/Cas12a-based system that combines RPA and CRISPR/Cas12a for Xap identification. A total of three crRNAs were designed to target a highly conserved ABC transporter ATP-binding protein-encoding gene ftsX to make specific detection of Xap. Results showed that crRNA 2 and crRNA 3 could get consistent detection for Xap. To realize the visualization of detection results, we additionally introduced FQ-reporter and FB-reporter. The developed method was highly sensitive and could detect as low as 10–18 M Xap gDNA with a mini-UV torch, corresponding to 1.63 copies/μl or 8.855 fg/μl gDNA of Xap, while with lateral flow strips, the sensitivity was 10–17 M. In addition, this method could specifically detect Xap from other closely related bacteria or pathogens associated with peach diseases. Furthermore, this method could make correct identification for Xap with crude DNA using NaOH-based extraction (3 min) directly from diseased peach samples. Considering that the developed method could get results within 2 h and could be performed at 37°C (body temperature), it is promising to be applied for Xap diagnosis and monitoring in fields.

Sensitivity of Colletotrichum fructicola and Colletotrichum siamense of Peach in China to Multiple Classes of Fungicides and Characterization of Pyraclostrobin-Resistant Isolates.

Anthracnose, mainly caused by Colletotrichum gloeosporioides species complex including Colletotrichum fructicola and Colletotrichum siamense, is a devastating disease of peach. Chemical control has been widely used for years, but management failures have increased with the commonly used fungicides. Therefore, screening of sensitivity of Colletotrichum spp. to fungicides with different modes of action is needed to make proper management strategies for peach anthracnose. In this study, the sensitivity of 80 isolates of C. fructicola and C. siamense was screened for pyraclostrobin, procymidone, prochloraz, and fludioxonil based on mycelial growth inhibition at discriminatory doses. Results showed that C. fructicola and C. siamense isolates were highly resistant to procymidone and fludioxonil with 100% resistance frequencies to both fungicides, but sensitive to prochloraz, i.e., no resistant isolates were found. For pyraclostrobin, 74% of C. fructicola isolates showed high resistance, 26% showed low resistance, and all of the C. siamense isolates showed low resistance. No positive cross-resistance was observed between pyraclostrobin and azoxystrobin even when they are members of the same quinone outside inhibitor (QoI) fungicide group or between pyraclostrobin and non-QoIs. Resistant isolates to QoI fungicides were evaluated for the fitness penalty. Results showed that no significant differences except for the mycelial growth rates that were detected between high- and low-resistance isolates of C. fructicola. Molecular characterization of the Cyt b gene revealed that the G143A point mutation was the determinant of the high resistance in C. fructicola. This study demonstrated the resistance status of C. fructicola and C. siamense to different fungicides and briefly discussed implications of that resistance. Demethylation inhibitor fungicides were found to be the best option among the different chemicals studied here, to control peach anthracnose in China.

Essential oils to control postharvest diseases of apples and peaches: elucidation of the mechanism of action

Essential oils to control postharvest diseases of apples and peaches: elucidation of the mechanism of action

L2MXception: an improved Xception network for classification of peach diseases

BackgroundPeach diseases can cause severe yield reduction and decreased quality for peach production. Rapid and accurate detection and identification of peach diseases is of great importance. Deep learning has been applied to detect peach diseases using imaging data. However, peach disease image data is difficult to collect and samples are imbalance. The popular deep networks perform poor for this issue.ResultsThis paper proposed an improved Xception network named as L2MXception which ensembles regularization term of L2-norm and mean. With the peach disease image dataset collected, results on seven mainstream deep learning models were compared in details and an improved loss function was integrated with regularization term L2-norm and mean (L2M Loss). Experiments showed that the Xception model with L2M Loss outperformed the current best method for peach disease prediction. Compared to the original Xception model, the validation accuracy of L2MXception was up to 93.85%, increased by 28.48%.ConclusionsThe proposed L2MXception network may have great potential in early identification of peach diseases.

モモせん孔細菌病に対する“春型枝病斑の早期切除技術”の指標化

モモせん孔細菌病に対する“春型枝病斑の早期切除技術”の指標化

Identification and biological control of postharvest diseases of peach

Identification and biological control of postharvest diseases of peach

In vitro co-culture system for Prunus spp. and Armillaria mellea in phenolic foam rooting matric

Armillaria and Desarmillaria spp. are causal agents of a devastating root-borne disease of peach. Breeding resistant rootstock requires a reliable screening tool. An in vitro co-culture screen designed for almond was modified by replacing agar-gelled medium with a more aerated phenolic foam and combining resistant and susceptible rootstocks (i.e., common garden experiment) and minimizes variation in inoculum pressure or rooting substrate among replicate vessels. Eight Prunus rootstocks tested (peach, plum, peach × plum, and choke cherry) were rooted and had no decline in health. Susceptible peach rootstock, ‘GF 305’, was cultured for 15 wk in phenolic foam in the same vessel with a resistant peach × plum hybrid, ‘MP-29’, inoculated with Armillaria mellea at week 5, that led to more severe shoot symptoms in the former after an additional 8 wk. This method accommodated peach genotypes that were difficult to root in agar medium. The difference during a uniform challenge with the A. mellea fungus recapitulates resistant/susceptible reactions. The phenolic foam-based co-culture method will work on many Prunus spp. of potential use in rootstock breeding.

Study on the optimal antagonistic effect of a bacterial complex against Monilinia fructicola in peach.

Peach brown rot caused by Monilinia fructicola is one of the most economically destructive diseases of peach (Prunus persica L.) in some orchards of China. Biocontrol is a significant strategy that exhibits strong levels of control and ecologically sound concepts in disease management. The purpose of this study was to investigate the combined suppressive effects of three endophytic bacterial strains (xj-14, xj-15, and xj-16) and two soil rhizosphere bacterial strains (xj-A and xj-C) that were shown to have strong inhibitory activity toward M. fructicola in our previous study. The optimal strains and the optimized combination of strains were determined. The combination of strains xj-15 and xj-C inhibited M. fructicola more intensively for a longer period of time. Following the application of 1 × 109 CFU/mL bacterial complex to the fruits, leaves, and shoots of peach trees infected with M. fructicola, the rate of inhibition reached 73.80%, 83.33%, and 90.43%, respectively. A pot experiment using lettuce (Lactuca sativa) showed that inoculation with the bacterial complex significantly increased the growth of seedlings. In this study, some compound bacteria were more effective than those in previous study in suppressing disease and promoting growth, which have the potential to be further applied in the field.

Using essential oils to control diseases in strawberries and peaches

Strawberry and peach crops are of great economic and social importance, mainly due to the added value and income generation for small and medium producers in different regions of Brazil. Some fungal diseases can compromise the final profitability of production, such as those caused by Colletotrichum sp., Botrytis cinerea and Monilinia fructicola fungi. The control of these pathogens mainly occurs through fungicides, which has been generating concern for consumers, as well as biological imbalance and environmental contamination. The need for new alternatives for disease control has been leading to more research being conducted on essential oils. Our scientific questions were based on a compilation of experiments which revealed the efficiency of essential oils in disease control. With the purpose of evaluating the fungicidal activity of Aloysia citriodora, Cymbopogon winterianus, Lippia alba and Ocimum americanum essential oils on the control of fungi, such as Colletotrichum sp., Botrytis cinerea and Monilinia fructicola in vitro and in the post-harvest of fruits, this work was developed at the Federal University of Santa Maria, Frederico Westphalen county (Rio Grande do Sul state), Brazil, from 2016 to 2018. The following evaluations were done: (i) characterization of essential oil doses in vitro for controlling Colletotrichum sp., Botrytis cinerea and Monilinia fructicola fungi, and (ii) determination of the minimum inhibitory concentration (Ω, mL/L) of essential oils in post-harvest of strawberries and peaches. All essential oils have high fungicidal activity in vitro experiments. The A. citriodora, L. alba and O. americanum essential oils had a satisfactory effect for post-harvest controlling of Colletotrichum sp. C. winterianus and O. americanum. The essential oils promoted satisfactory post-harvest control of Botrytis cinerea in strawberries. All essential oils have high fungitoxicity against Monilinia fructicola in vitro and post-harvest, highlighting the greater efficiency of A. citriodora essential oil in peaches. The essential oils present high fungitoxicity for controlling diseases in strawberries and peaches, presenting high potential performance for formulating commercial fungicide.

Development of a loop-mediated isothermal amplification method for the rapid detection of Venturia carpophila on peach.

Peach scab, caused by Venturia carpophila, can significantly reduce both the yield and quality of peach fruit. It is difficult to distinguish peach scab from other peach diseases such as black spot and bacterial spot. An efficient assay is needed to identify V. carpophila in order to develop scientific management strategies. A set of loop-mediated isothermal amplification (LAMP) primers was designed based on the internal transcribed spacer (rDNA-ITS) sequence to detect V. carpophila. Compared with the conventional polymerase chain reaction (PCR) method, the LAMP method not only exhibited higher sensitivity and specificity in the detection of V. carpophila, but also required simpler equipment and less operational time. The minimum detectable concentration of V. carpophila genomic DNA with the LAMP method was 56.6 fg μl-1 , which was 100 times lower than with the conventional PCR method. When eight fungal species including V. carpophila (23 isolates from 14 provinces) and one bacterial species were used with LAMP detection, only V. carpophila showed a color change, from brown to yellowish green, and ladder-like bands in electrophoresis, indicating successful amplification. Moreover, when crude DNAs of peach fruit samples were used in LAMP detection, amplification was observed only from diseased fruits, and not from healthy fruits and the negative control. The LAMP assay shows simplicity, rapidity, high sensitivity and specificity, and will be useful in distinguishing scab caused by Venturia carpophila from other diseases with similar symptoms. © 2020 Society of Chemical Industry.

Fine mapping and identification of candidate genes for the peach powdery mildew resistance gene Vr3

Powdery mildew is one of the major diseases of peach (Prunus persica), caused by the ascomycete Podosphaera pannosa. Currently, it is controlled through calendar-based fungicide treatments starting at petal fall, but an alternative is to develop resistant peach varieties. Previous studies mapped a resistance gene (Vr3) in interspecific populations between almond (‘Texas’) and peach (‘Earlygold’). To obtain molecular markers highly linked to Vr3 and to reduce the number of candidate genes, we fine-mapped Vr3 to a genomic region of 270 kb with 27 annotated genes. To find evidence supporting one of these positional candidate genes as being responsible of Vr3, we analyzed the polymorphisms of the resequences of both parents and used near-isogenic lines (NILs) for expression analysis of the positional candidate genes in symptomatic or asymptomatic leaves. Genes differentially expressed between resistant and susceptible individuals were annotated as a Disease Resistance Protein RGA2 (Prupe2G111700) or an Eceriferum 1 protein involved in epicuticular wax biosynthesis (Prupe2G112800). Only Prupe2G111700 contained a variant predicted to have a disruptive effect on the encoded protein, and was overexpressed in both heterozygous and homozygous individuals containing the Vr3 almond allele, compared with susceptible individuals. This information was also useful to identify and validate molecular markers tightly linked and flanking Vr3. In addition, the NILs used in this work will facilitate the introgression of this gene into peach elite materials, alone or pyramided with other known resistance genes such as peach powdery mildew resistance gene Vr2.

The Effect of Tractor Speed and Canopy Position on Fungicide Spray Deposition and Peach Scab Incidence and Severity.

Peach scab, caused by Venturia carpophila, is a damaging disease of peach in the southeastern United States. Thus, fungicides are applied to reduce peach scab. Tractor speed was investigated as a variable affecting spray deposition and disease control in relation to volume applied. In experiments in 2015 and 2016, trees were sprayed with fungicide to control scab at petal fall to 1% shuck split and at shuck split to 10% shuck off. Speeds were 3.2, 4.8, and 6.4 kph resulting in 1,403, 935, and 701 liters/ha, respectively, with the dose of active ingredient (a.i.) per ha kept constant. Deposition declined for all speeds with later spray dates. There was a negative linear relationship between tractor speed and spray coverage on three of four dates the experiment was repeated. Tractor speed (different volumes, equal doses) affected peach scab. In 2015 and 2016, mean incidence at 3.2, 4.8, and 6.4 kph was 68.6, 59.2, and 38.3%, and 64.2, 53.0, and 40.4% of fruit scabbed, respectively. Effect of speed on lesion number per fruit depended on year: in 2015, lesions per fruit were reduced at 6.4 kph compared with 3.2 and 4.8 kph but were not different in 2016. Control trees had fewer lesions per fruit high in the canopy, but there was little effect of sample height in fungicide-treated trees. Concentration of a.i. in lower volumes applied at higher speed may provide some benefit in reducing incidence of peach scab, but there appeared to be less effect on severity.

Proteomic analysis upon peach fruit infection with Monilinia fructicola and M. laxa identify responses contributing to brown rot resistance

Brown rot, caused by Monilinia spp., is a major peach disease worldwide. In this study, the response of peach cultivars Royal Glory (RG) and Rich Lady (RL) to infection by Monilinia fructicola or Monilinia laxa, was characterized. Phenotypic data, after artificial inoculations, revealed that ‘RL’ was relatively susceptible whereas ‘RG’ was moderately resistant to Monilinia spp. Comparative proteomic analysis identified mesocarp proteins of the 2 cultivars whose accumulation were altered by the 2 Monilinia species. Functional analysis indicated that pathogen-affected proteins in ‘RG’ were mainly involved in energy and metabolism, while, differentially accumulated proteins by the pathogen presence in ‘RL’ were involved in disease/defense and metabolism. A higher number of proteins was differentiated in ‘RG’ fruit compared to ‘RL’. Upon Monilinia spp. infection, various proteins were-down accumulated in ‘RL’ fruit. Protein identification by mass spectrometric analysis revealed that several defense-related proteins including thaumatin, formate dehydrogenase, S-formylglutathione hydrolase, CBS domain-containing protein, HSP70, and glutathione S-transferase were up-accumulated in ‘RG’ fruit following inoculation. The expression profile of selected defense-related genes, such as major latex allergen, 1-aminocyclopropane-1-carboxylate deaminase and UDP-glycoltransferase was assessed by RT-PCR. This is the first study deciphering differential regulations of peach fruit proteome upon Monilinia infection elucidating resistance responses.

First Report of Didymosphaeria rubi-ulmifolii Causing Wood Rot of Peach (Prunus persica) in China

China is the largest producer of peaches (Prunus persica) in the world, with an annual yield accounting for over 50% of the world peach product. In January 2019, a severe wood rot disease of peach was observed in Hefei City, Anhui Province of China. Mean disease incidence was estimated as 10% in 5-ha orchards. Typical symptoms were characterized by wood internal vascular discoloration and canker on stems. Seven samples were collected from symptomatic stems of peach trees and cut to small pieces (4 × 4 mm) from the margin of the lesions, and they were surface disinfected in 75% ethanol for 20 s and 2% NaClO for 1 min, followed by rinsing three times with sterilized water, placed on potato dextrose agar (PDA), and incubated at 25°C. In total, six representative fungal colonies were isolated from infected stems on PDA medium and named as GF1 to GF6. Colonies on PDA showed brown at the early stages and turned to black after 5 days. Conidia were ellipsoid or short cylindrical, continuous, sometimes separate, olivaceous, and 3.4 to 4.6 × 2 to 2.3 μm. Total DNAs of the three isolates were extracted for PCR sequencing using primers for the rDNA internal transcribed spacer (ITS) (ITS1/ITS4, ITS1/ITS2, and ITS4/ITS5) and TUB2 (βT2a/βT2b) (Arredondo-Santoyo et al. 2018; Damm et al. 2008). ITS sequences (MN932144, MN947626, and MN944552) and TUB2 (BankIt2303021) were deposited in GenBank. BLAST searches showed ITS sequences had over 99.65% sequence similarity with Paraconiothyrium brasiliense strain KH1W (MK779925.1), STE-U 6300 (EU295651.1), and CBS 254.88 (JX496058.1), respectively. The sequences of TUB2 showed 97.98% similarity with P. brasiliense TUB2 sequences (LT796975.1). Based on the morphological and molecular analysis (Verkley et al. 2004), we confirmed the newly isolated strains belong to Didymosphaeria rubi-ulmifolii (basionym: P. brasiliense) (Ariyawansa et al. 2014). Pathogenicity trials were conducted on 5-year-old P. persica trees. Two-year-old healthy shoots were surface sterilized with 70% ethanol. Conidial suspension (50 μl, 5 × 10⁶ conidia/ml) was added into the wound (a hole of 2 to 2.5 mm deep). Control branches were treated with sterilized water. The inoculated plants were maintained at 25 ± 3°C with 95% humidity for 14 days. All those treated with isolates showed lesions of branches, but not the water-treated control plants. Reisolation was performed from symptomatic branches, and their identities were confirmed using the above-mentioned methods. All tests were performed three times, and pathogenicity tests employed five plants for each strain. To our knowledge, this is the first report of D. rubi-ulmifolii causing canker disease on peach species in China.

Detection of Peach Disease Image Based on Asymptotic Non-Local Means and PCNN-IPELM

Aiming at the problems of noise, background interference and low detection in peach disease image, this paper proposes a detection method of peach disease based on the asymptotic non-local means (ANLM) image algorithm and the fusion of parallel convolution neural network (PCNN) and extreme learning machine(ELM) optimized by linear particle swarm optimization(IPSO). Firstly, the method uses the ANLM image denoising algorithm to reduce the interference of the complex background in the image, then uses the parallel convolution neural network proposed by this paper to identify the characteristics of peach disease, uses the improved elu activation function instead of the conventional ReLu activation function, and uses the linear particle swarm optimized ELM (IPELM) proposed by this paper in the last layer instead of the traditional softmax layer, the update method is improved from two aspects to improve the convergence speed and accuracy of the network effectively. The results of 25513 images showed that the highest detection accuracy of brown rot, black spot, anthracnose, scab and normal peach were 89.02, 90.56, 85.37, 86.70 and 89.91 percent respectively, which indicated that this method was an effective method for peach disease detection.

Екологічно безпечні заходи регулювання чисельності шкідливих організмів у персикових (Persica vulgaris Mill.) насадженнях

According to the results of the researches in 2016-2018, the display terms and intensity of the major peach diseases development changes from year to year and depends mainly on the weather conditions that in the south of Ukraine are favorable for the mass spread and development of Taphrina deformans Tull., Clacterosporium carpophilum (Lev.) Aderh. and Monilia cinerea Bonord. The leaves affection by Taphrina damage appeared to be 35.0-56.3 %, the intensity of the disease development being 22.4-23.4 %; Clacterosporium – 16.5 and 5.4 %, Monilia – up to 15.0 %. When studying the species composition of the peach entomocomplex, 6 major pests were detected among insects as follows: Anarsia lineatella Zell., Archips rosana L., Grapholitha molesta Busck, Lithocolletis cerasicolella H.S, Sciaphobus squalidus Gyll. and Brachycaudus tragopogonis Kalt. Lepidoptera prevailes (67 %) among them. Other species of pests (17 %) belong to the rows Coleoptera and Homoptera. The complex application of the chemical (Bordeaux Isagro, 20 % Copper Sulphate, 5.0 kg/ha) and a mixture of the biological preparations (Trichodermin, 2.0 l/ha, Planriz, 1.0 l/ha, Pentofag, 5.0 l/ha, Gaupsin, 3.0-5.0 l/ha, Lepidocide, 10 l/ha) at the beginning of the bud swell, and before and after the peach flowering, proves to protect reliably the orchards against harmful organisms. The technical efficiency of the above mentioned preparations against the main diseases and dominant pests 63.0-89.0 and 50.0-94.0 % respectively.

Identification of the Fungal Pathogens of Postharvest Disease on Peach Fruits and the Control Mechanisms of Bacillus subtilis JK-14.

Postharvest fungal disease is one of the significant factors that limits the storage period and marketing life of peaches, and even result in serious economic losses worldwide. Biological control using microbial antagonists has been explored as an alternative approach for the management of postharvest disease of fruits. However, there is little information available regarding to the identification the fungal pathogen species that cause the postharvest peach diseases and the potential and mechanisms of using the Bacillus subtilis JK-14 to control postharvest peach diseases. In the present study, a total of six fungal isolates were isolated from peach fruits, and the isolates of Alternaria tenuis and Botrytis cinerea exhibited the highest pathogenicity and virulence on the host of mature peaches. In the culture plates, the strain of B. subtilis JK-14 showed the significant antagonistic activity against the growth of A. tenuis and B. cinerea with the inhibitory rates of 81.32% and 83.45% at 5 days after incubation, respectively. Peach fruits treated with different formulations of B. subtilis JK-14 significantly reduced the mean disease incidences and lesion diameters of A. tenuis and B. cinerea. The greatest mean percent reduction of the disease incidences (81.99% and 71.34%) and lesion diameters (82.80% and 73.57%) of A. tenuis and B. cinerea were obtained at the concentration of 1 × 107 CFU mL−1 (colony forming unit, CFU). Treatment with the strain of B. subtilis JK-14 effectively enhanced the activity of the antioxidant enzymes-superoxide dismutase (SOD), peroxidase (POD) and catalase (CAT) in A. tenuis and B. cinerea inoculated peach fruits. As such, the average activities of SOD, POD and CAT were increased by 36.56%, 17.63% and 20.35%, respectively, compared to the sterile water treatment. Our results indicate that the isolates of A. tenuis and B. cinerea are the main pathogens that cause the postharvest peach diseases, and the strain of B. subtilis JK-14 can be considered as an environmentally-safe biological control agent for the management of postharvest fruits diseases. We propose the possible mechanisms of the strain of B. subtilis JK-14 in controlling of postharvest peach diseases.