Growers have depended on the specificity and efficacy of streptomycin and oxytetracycline as a part of their plant disease arsenal since the middle of the 20th century. With climate change intensifying plant bacterial epidemics, the established success of these antibiotics remains threatened. Our strong reliance on certain antibiotics for devastating diseases eventually gave way to resistance development. Although antibiotics in plant agriculture equal to less than 0.5% of overall antibiotic use in the United States, it is still imperative for humans to continue to monitor usage, environmental residues, and resistance in bacterial populations. This review provides an overview of the history and use, resistance and mitigation, regulation, environmental impact, and economics of antibiotics in plant agriculture. Bacterial issues, such as the ongoing Huanglongbing (citrus greening) epidemic in Florida citrus production, may need antibiotics for adequate control. Therefore, preserving the efficacy of our current antibiotics by utilizing more targeted application methods, such as trunk injection, should be a major focus.[ ] Copyright © 2024 The Author(s). This is an open access article distributed under the CC BY 4.0 International license .

The destructive citrus disease, Huanglongbing (HLB) or citrus greening, continues to devastate Florida’s citrus industry. A hemipteran insect, the Asian citrus psyllid (ACP), disperses Candidatus Liberibacter asiaticus, one of the putative bacterial pathogens of HLB. This study builds upon ongoing research utilizing high-throughput sequencing to analyze the virome of ACP populations collected from citrus groves throughout Florida. Following the widespread detection of sequences aligning to the genome of citrus tristeza virus (CTV) across consecutive years in the Florida ACP virome, we continued to detect a pervasive amount of CTV in Florida ACPs during subsequent years. Simultaneously, we also detected mixed infections of CTV strains in pooled ACPs from different Florida regions. Predating the HLB epidemic, CTV has been present in Florida for many years and our results confirm its widespread and diverse persistence in Florida citrus groves through a unique lens, the ACP. CTV presence in the ACP likely results from feeding on CTV-infected citrus trees in Florida citrus groves, which may help to understand an overlapping presence of CTV and HLB, both endemic citrus pathosystems in the state, and their role in future integrated pest management strategies.