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[dice]

I did not use any barrier to keep the roots out of the reservoir
this year. Two HEBs came down with verticillium wilt. I don't
know that the reservoir played a role (cold weather that
kept the soil wet for weeks on end was doubtless a factor
either way).

In one it whacked a Black Cherry pretty hard that grew back
some healthy branches that produced decent tasting fruit
by end of summer. In the other one a New Yorker shrugged
it off completely while a Pipo in the same HEB never recovered
and produced a few horrible tasting fruit (I had another Pipo
in a different container that was healthy, so I know it is not
supposed to taste like that).

I don't know whether verticillium in particular can survive in
a completely flooded anaerobic environment, but it does like
cold, waterlogged soil, so I would not be surprised if it could.

Edit:
I saved the container mix from the HEBs that had verticillium
so that I can use it to test whether some other varieties have
any verticillium tolerance. First candidate: a Brandyboy
off-type that I got seeds of from Gobig. (Brandyboy is listed
as having VFNT disease tolerance at PlantFiles; I want to
see if the Faux Brandyboy has it too.)