Where symptoms are severe, tree vigor and fruit quality and yield are diminished. Reports of peach leaf curl have increased in recent years, possibly because relatively mild winters have favored the survival of the pathogen in bark and bud scales. A related disease, plum pockets, affects plums. Diseased leaves are reddish to purple in color, and thickened, twisted, and generally distorted. Leaves later turn brown and fall from the tree.
Diseased fruit are bumpy, reddish in color, and fall prematurely.
The pathogen overwinters in bark and bud scales. Fungal spores infect leaves and shoots during spring while leaves are still in the bud and during bud burst. As the fungus grows in plant tissues, it disrupts normal cell development resulting in distorted, off-color leaves, shoots, and fruit. Additional spores form on the surface of diseased tissues, and these spores go on to start new infections if the weather remains mild and wet. If significant premature leaf drop occurs, trees will be susceptible to drought stress and winter injury.