Nature of damage:

• Initially, dark green streaks appears in the veins of lower portion of the leaf midrib and the leaf.
• Dark green, hook-like extensions of the leaf lamina veins can be seen in the narrow, light-green zone between the midrib and the lamina.
• On mature plants infected with BBTV, new leaves emerge with difficulty, are narrower than normal, are wavy rather than flat, and have yellow (chlorotic) leaf margins.
• They appear to be “bunched” at the top of the plant, the symptom for which this disease is named.
• Severely infected banana plants usually will not fruit, but if fruit is produced, the banana hands and fingers are likely to be distorted and twisted.

Culture control:

• Use virus free Tissue Culture planting materials.
• Remove and rouging of infected banana plants.
• Chop, dry and bury the infected plants.
• Maintain clean, weed free field.
• Avoid banana cultivation in sugarcane and cucurbitaceous areas as sugarcane mosaic virus or cucurbit mosaic virus can easily spread to banana.

Chemical Control:

The diseased trees should be injected with 4 ml of Fernoxone solution(50g in 400 ml of water)

Insertion of Fernoxone capsules (containing 200 to 400 mg of chemical per capsule) into the pseudostem by using the banana injector or capsule applicator.