Arizona republican., 1891-08-28
FUSlcLADlUn DENTR1 1lCuM.
Tho Worst Enemy of tho Apple and Pear.
 How to Control It.

pears are often entirely ruined by black
 "scabs forming on the surfaces of the
 fruit, not only spelling its appearance
 but dwarfipg it as we'll Where fruit is
 badly attacked it cracks open.
 Some varieties have been nearly all
 ruined by scab for several years past.
 The most notable examples are the white
 winter Pearmain apple and the winter
 Nellis pear. Whoever has these two
 fruits in bearing should know what ap-
 pie scab is. It is also very injurious to
 many other apples. The best apple of all
 the Yellow Newtown pippin--is often
 seriously injured, also the red June,
 Baldwin and Early Harvest. Some va rieties are not injured in the fruit but the leaves are badly affected. A few are injured in neither to any noticeable extent.
 Many varieties of pears gre no longer planted, this disease constantly running them. The winter Nelis. which in for mer years was planted largely and prof itably, is no longer of any value. Also
 the white Doyenne and many others. The Bartlett is fast going down the same grade,
 This is progressive disease, constantly spreading and increasing in virulence. There seems to be no let up to it when once it enters q region. The fruits sus- ceptible to it are attacked and destroyed in turn until, if Prof. Bailey of Cornell university, N. Y,, be right, it may sweep the entire apple and pear crops cut of 8 vast region for one season at least. He attributes the almost complete failure of
 the apple and pear crops of New York state last season to an abnormal develop ment and great virulence of scab. If it is very abundant and the season is right for its development, it attacks the buds before the flowers open and kills the fruit at once.
 Experiments during the past three or four years, both here and in the East, have demonstrated that this most injur- ious disease can be controlled. If it can be prevented from doing material injury to the most susceptible fruits in Eastern regions where crops had failed for years on its account, we certainly ought to be able tO control it, even on fruits worst damaged by 1t, It is very difficult to control it where summer rains and heavy dews prevail
 The disease is a parasite fungus, or a minute howerless plant that roots in and feeds among the tissues of living plants. Such fungi are usually confined as hosts to one or a few species of plants. This particular one is supposed to be confined in its food habits to the species of the sub genus Pyrus, to which the apple, pear and several other species belong. It propagates from very minute pollen like bodies which serve the fungi the same as seeds do Towering plants. These pass the winter in myriads on the tree, fallen leaves and fruits and are carried to the young fruits by winds, or, when in the air are carried to the fruit by rain. Here they germinate and send their threadlike rootlets through the skin of the fruit or leaf, into the cells below There the true fungus grows and robs the cells of their contents and the elab- orated plant food which in the fruit stops the growth and multiplication of cells so far as it penetrates, mak. ing a depression in the fruit. Event ually the fruiting heads of the fungus burst through the skin of the fruit and throws millions of spores into the air to contaminate other fruits and leaves. Cryptogamists are not fully agreed that 1t is one and the same fungus that at. tacks both fruit and leaves. The best evidence, however, is that they reident. ical. But this is unimportant, as the same remedy destroys both the fruit and the leaf scabs. After the spores are thrown of the fungus dies--thorgh it's spores may lodge on the same fruit and further involve it-and tho growth in the fruit below the scab gradually turns the black fruiting head out, forming the well known black scab. If the fruit is largely involved the growth below rup- lures the hard, dry, dead matter and it cracks open transversely, often ruptur- ing healthy cells on either side. In such cases we have scab and cralSing of the fruit. The spores can only germinate on the surface of the leaf or fruit, ex- cept in presence of moisture. Hence in dry summers none but the spring crop is very troublesome, except quite near the ocean where fogs and dews prevail. Unfortunately there is where winter apples and most pears otherwise succeed best. Again our spring climate favors the development of this and some other destructive fungi.
 The spores of this and luany other fungi cannot germinate in the presence of the salts and sulphates of copper and many of the combinations of sulphur, whose bases are poisonous to the young germs as they develop. Spraying the trees just slthe buds begin to swell, with a strong solution of sulphate of copper is effective. Take one pound ofsulphate dissolved in two gallons of water and add eight gallons of water; larger quan- titles in same proportion. Spray the tree thoroughly so that it will drip and wet the fallen leaves on tke ground. This will well nigh destroy the scah. When spraying to kill the apple worm directly after the blossoms fall if we mix London purple in the Bordeaux mixture instead of water we have the best poi son for the apple worm and the best fun gicide to kill and prevent the apple scab. The Bordeaux mixture is made as fol- | lows; Dissolve i2 pounds of sulphate of copper (blue vitrioD in 150 gallons of water; slake 20 pounds of best quick {, lime in 10 gallons of water; when this is cool pour it slowly into the other solu- tion stirring constantly. Let it stand