[3] The disease is endemic in the mid-Atlantic and Ohio River Valley regions and in the southern portion of the Corn Belt.

Stewart's Wilt causes minor reductions in field corn yield, despite common occurrence, because most hybrids grown in the Midwest have adequate resistance.

[4] Stewart's wilt affects plants, particularly types of maize such as sweet, flint, dent, flour, and popcorn.

[7] Chaetocnema pulicaria, the primary vector for P. stewartii, overwinters as adults and begins feeding on corn seedlings early in the spring.

When large populations of corn flea beetles are feeding, skeletonization of leaves and death of seedlings can occur.

[7][failed verification] A good way to determine corn has Stewart's wilt symptoms is to look at the leaf tissue under microscope.

With certain sweet-corn hybrids, yellow, slimy ooze collects on the inner ear husks and/or covers the corn kernels.

Warm winter temperatures favor the survival of flea beetle vectors and increase the risk of Stewart's disease.

Snow or other winter cover apparently provides insufficient shelter to enhance survival of the overwintering flea beetles.

In North America, Stewart's wilt is found in the mid-Atlantic and the Ohio River Valley regions and in the southern portion of the Corn Belt.

Stewart's wilt can also be found in eastern and midwestern states and portions of Canada, but this depends on whether or not the corn flea beetles survive the winters.

External disease control is conducted by insecticide spraying to stop early feeding of overwintering flea beetles.

When establishing control measures, spraying should be repeated several times to regulate the presence of the insecticide products in the field.

[clarification needed] The susceptible varieties suffer losses ranging from 40 to 100% when infected prior to the five-leaf stage.

Stewart's wilt impacts include stand reductions, production of fewer and smaller ears, and an increased susceptibility of wilt-infected plants to stalk rotting organisms.

Stewart's wilt was first observed by T. J. Burrill in the late 1880s while studying fire blights in the corn fields of southern Illinois.

Burrill associated the symptoms he found with dry weather and chinch bug damage, yet he indicated that bacteria could be the cause for the disease.

After completion of Koch's postulates with the bacteria in sweet corn, Stewart gave an accurate account of the symptoms and named the pathogen Pseudomonas stewartii in 1898.

Another 25 years later, a corn flea beetle, Chaetocnema pulicaria, was identified as the primary vector responsible for the midseason spread of the disease.

In 1923, Glenn Smith, a USDA scientist working at Purdue University, created a hybrid from two different lines of the regular, susceptible 'Golden Bantam'.