The Hood River glacier. (Hood River, Or.) 1889-1933, 1914-06-11
BLIGHT INFECTION
CARRIED BY TOOLS

(From Spokane Spokesmsn-Reyiew.)
!. r. Shinn, county farm expert. Of
Spokane, has issued the following
statement on fire blight. which is
arouslng the orehardists Of the north
west:
pear blight has already made its
appearance in some Of the trees in this
section this season. | have found il
actively at work upon the pear and ap-
I pie trees and also find a similar blight
affecting the sweet cherry and the Car
Olina poplar his is a disease to be
/ feared as much among trees as small
pox with the human race and cholera
with swine. No person who is at all
public spirited should allow this dis
ease to be prevalent in his or bis
neighbOr's orchard without giving heed
thereto.
blight is a bacterial disease and
has been known to occur since l7S0,
though its exact nature was not dis
covered until DR.. I. J. Burrill, of the
University Of Illinois, found it to be
due to a certain kind Of bacteria a CEN
tury later. Since the exact cause of
the disease has been found, an enOr-
nous amount of work has been carried
on to find how the disease is carried
through the winter.
These bacteria do not live in the
soil, neither do they blow about in the
wind. They pass through the winter
season by living in diseased portions of
trunks and limbs. These diseased areas
are known as cankers, have a decidedly
black color, and when active eXude a
gummy substance filled with bacteria.
Indications are that about 25 per cent
of these cankers become active in the
spring. so it is very important to rid
the tree of them during the dormant
season.
"lnsects coming in contact with this
gummy exudatiOn carry the blight in
fection from place to place. When
blOssoming, blight is very active early
in the season, bees are considered to be
the principal agents in carrying it.
Later infection on twigs is usually at
tributed to biting and sucking insects
or birds, such as the sapsuckers or
woOdpeCkers.
Pruning tools not properly disin-
fected and used in orchards where
blight has occurred, also furnish one of
the dangerous sources of carrying in
fectiOn. Many orchardists have inno-
Gently carried infection from one end
of their orchards TO the other by cut
ting into some blight and then using
the same tools without disinfecting
them to prune the remaining trees in
the orchard.
tNTha cproal ,F Iliubt iu Inv
ing wet or moist weather and least
noted during dry seasons. Very rank
growing trees are usually more suscep-
tible to blight than slow growing sorts.
Blight does not do the damage in
orchards where the wood is well ma
tured that it does in wood that passes
into the winter in a sappy condition.
"TO control blight all holdover can
kers should be removed during the dor
mant season. If blight shows its ap-
pearance now, no time should be lost in
removing it. Care should be exercised
to get rid Of all affected tissue. Suffi-
cient bark and wood should be removed
to be sure that nothing is affected
above or below the blight.
"Twigs should never be broken from
trees unless one is certain that all
affected tissue is removed with them.
All cut areas and tools used in the
work should be thoroughly disinfected
with a corrosive sublimate solution,
used at a strength of one to 1000.
These tablets, which are deadly poison,
may be purchased from drug stores and
prepared according to directions to get
the proper strength solution.
"Reiance should not be placed in
patent remedies for blight, because
none exist. The only way to keep
blight under control is for every orch
ardist and every other townsman or
farmer, to be on the alert at this sea
son in locating and stamping out the
disease as soon as its presence is dis
covered in community"