The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1915-12-02

! ing the tree and roofing it out. A tree
 partly injured by collar blight may be cleaned up and saved. This often re- qufres digging the dirt away and work partly underground. It is necessary, i however, to follow the margin of the disease, even if it carries you into the ground, just as if you were tracing the boundaries of island. It IS
 usually best to condemn a tree girdled
 by collar blight. It is possible, how ever, after doing thorough work of eradication with a rather mild case of collar blight, to bridge graft and thus save the tree by the same process used in bridge grafting a tree girdled 1 by mice or other animals.
 | Collar blight can best be detected in the autumn, just before the pear or apple trees shed their leaves This and similar injuries to the collar of a tree will cause the leaves to, yellow and assume bronze or autumn co1ors 1 and even drop, while those on the nor
 nal healthy trees are still green. Othr | CT troubles, such as injuries by mice, frost collar girdle, and fungous root rot cause similar symptoms, but these symptoms should lead to an inspec- 1 ton of the collar.
 | To inspect the collar of a tree or any doubtful point on the body or on large limbs, dig ut with a carpenters s gouge or 8 sharp knife a small piece | of the outer bark, exposing an area of the fleshy bark the size of one's thumb nail. The cut should not be made through to the canbium and will do no injury if the bark is all right at that point. Always do this with a disinfectant in hand and promptly disinfect the cut, otherwise 1of he JicI7 at least give an opportunity for tnocula ton. Keep the knife or gouge con tinually disinfected during this inspec- i ton.
 Do not be deceived by the normal Irough-bark formation, which consists of the outer layers of bark which have died naturally. Fruit trees, like other trees, keep their bark smooth while young and vigorous. As they get older the outer layers begin to die, being replaced by vigorous young bark un- derneath. This process starts mainly at the base of the tree and works up ward, the oldest bark dying first. It also begins in spots on the branches, especially at the bases of fruit spurs or small twigs, and finally covers all the older branches of the tree. It is natural to the tree and needs no at tention except to distinguish it from the true blighted areas.
 III WOEh1HS out DdQ cases or DllBIS particularly on the collars, bodies, or larger branches where there is con- siderable live blight in the thick f1eshy bark, it is a good plan, after doing the work thoroughly. to mark such a case by tying a strip of cotton cloth around i the body or branch to distinguish it from non-virulent cases, then three or four days to a week later with a gouge or sharp knife retrim the margins to make sure that you worked beyond the blight at all points. The bark will disco1or naturally, so that this blight can not be detected without retrim- ming. If any of the blight were left color further the bark and show it. self This works better in warm weather than in cold weather.
 Having cleaned up the blight thor ough1y in the fall, when dealing with bad outbreaks it is a good plan to go over the orchard tree by tree and in spect in early spring when the buds are swelling, but we'll ahead of the blossoming period, to make sure that no, cases escaped. A bit of gumrny exudate will. of course, Immediately lead to examination with knife and gouge. Carry the kit of tools and dis infect and be prepared for further suspicious-1ooking case may be par tially or completely retrimmed, as above suggested.
 Painting Wounds
 In the autumn, after the wounds or eradication scars aue made, disin4 fected, and perhaps refnspected when deemed necessary, the exposed area of wood, especially if 1 inch or more in diameter, should be painted for other wounds. Since many of these areas may be large, it is important to give this wound treatment. Various materials are available. such as white lead paint, liquid grating wax, coal tar, or 8 mixture of three-fourths to Itworthirds coal tar and one-fourth to one-third creosote oil, all to be ap- piled with a stiff brush. Liquid graft ing wax is somewhat expensive and often requires warming, so that it is not usually preferred. Coal tar, while cheap requires warming, and is there fore difficult to apply The depart ment experts have used for this pur- pose mainly whitehead paint (nade rather thick, and preferably given a second coat) or the coa1-tar creosote mixture.
 Whitehead paint has some advan- tages. It is readily obtained and ap- lied, and if any of the gt1mmy exudate, which is more or less reddish or .brownish in color, flows from an i'm perfectly worked case it is readily de- tected on the white surface. On the other hand, this paint has proven a disappointment to the department and experiment. station pathologists in that it frequently has not preserved the wood from decay. It is rather too mild a disinfectant The wood cracks, lets in water and fungous spores, and fre- quently after three or four yearsfand before large wounds have healed wood-rot fungi have entered and de- cayed the wood under the paint. Even though applied to the wounds .wMen they are dry, the sap pressure, even in the autumn, often lifts the paint from the surface of the wound, par ticuIarly in the case of scars on the ends Of the branches.
 The coaI-tar creosote-oil mixture is