Arizona republican., 1891-03-28
FUSlcLADIUM DENTR 5IcUM.
The Worst Enemy ot the Apple and Pear.
 How to Control It.

How t0 control It.
 Apple growers, especially near the
 coast. and in damp climates everywhere,
 know that certain varieties ofapples and
 pears are often entirely ruined by black
 "scabs" forming on the surfaces of the
 fruit, not only spelling its appearance
 but dwarfipg itas well. 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 are no longer
 planted, this disease constantly running
 them. The winter Nellis, 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 a progressive disease, constantly
 spreading and increasing in virulence.
 There seems to be no let up to it when
 once it enters a 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 out of a
 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 1t 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 iniur- 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 it. It is very difficult to control it where summer rains and | heavy dews prevail.
 The disease is 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 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 t IS one and the same fungus that at .acks both fruit and leaves. The best evidence, however, is that they are ident- cal. But this is unimportant, as the 'ame remedy destroys both the fruit and he leaf scabs. After the spores are thrown of the fungus dies-though its spores may lodge on the same fruit and l further involve it--and the growth in he fruit below the scab gradually turns { he black fruiting head out, forming the we'll known black scab. If the fruit is argely involved the growth below rup- lures the hard, dry, dead matter and it racks open transversely, often ruptur- ng healthy cells on either side. In such ases we have scab and craking of the ruit. The spores can only germiuate { 'n the surface of the leaf or fruit, ex- ept in presence of moisture. Hence in Try summers none but the spring crop 8 very troublesome, except quite near ( he ocean where fogs and dews prevail. i Unfortunately there is where winter l ppies and most pears otherwise 6 ucceed best. Again our spring climate C avors the development of this and some l ther destructive fungi. a The spores of this and many other I ungi cannot germinate in the presence f f the salts and sulphates of copper and I many of the combinations of sulphur, V whose bases are poisonous to the young erms as they develop. Spraying the rees just asthe buds begin to swell, with strong solution of sulphate of copper ' effective. Take one pound of sulphate V issolved in two gallons of water and e dd eight gallons of water; larger quan- a ties in same proportion. Spray the rec thoroughly so that it will drip nd wet the fallen leaves on tEe ground. f, his will well nigh destroy the scab. IT When spraying to kill the apple worm n lrectly after the blossoms fall if we mix d ondon purple in the Bordeaux mixture lstead of water we have the best poi 'n for the apple worm and the best fun lcide to kill and prevent the apple scab. Ii he Bordeaux mixture is made as fol- is TVS: Dissolve 12 pounds of sulphate of cl ,pper (blue vitrioD in 15O gallons of -