GRAND JUNCTION, Colo. (AP) — A silent killer steadily encroaching on the most beloved of Western Slope fruit has moved into the crosshairs of peach growers and researchers.

It's a fungus so widespread that every orchard in the valley is infected, it's estimated to cost the local peach industry about $6 million a year and there's no silver bullet to eradicate it.

But the good news is that researchers with Colorado State University have found promising results and have discovered a potential way to manage this devastating fungus, called cytospora. Though it has become an epidemic in western Colo...