222 Fungi. 



our native species of Primus, but I have observed no case 

 in which it proved fatal to the tree. About forty years ago 

 Primus Cerasus was abundantly cultivated about Bethlehem, 

 but soon after nearly all these trees were destroyed by the 

 united agency of this Fungus and a small Cynips. So de- 

 structive were the works of these pests that our fruit- 

 growers have not restored their trees to this day. A 

 remedy has been sought but has not yet been found." 

 The observations of the learned mycologist have since his 

 time been repeatedly and sadly confirmed. In our own 

 section, farmers have too often been made' to realize the 

 injury-inflicting power of this Fungus, by their diminished 

 crops of plums and cherries, and eventually by the loss of 

 their trees. 



Another instance of the terrible consequences following 

 the attack of a cultivated plant by a Fungus is seen in the 

 potato rot. Within the last twenty-live years thousands 

 upon thousands of bushels of this staple article of food of 

 the civilized world have been destroyed by the insidious 

 workings of this almost invisible enemy. 



Let the variety of potatoe cultivated be one whose vigor 

 has been impaired by long cultivation, let the tubers be 

 planted in heavy moist soil, and let there be an abundance 

 of warm rain in late summer and early autumn and a large 

 per centage of the crop is quite certain to be lost. 



But uncultivated plants do not always escape death at 

 the hands of their parasitic enemies. In one instance at 

 least I have found the choke cherry, Primus Vtrginiana, 

 killed by the Black knot. A singular case of the destruc- 

 tion of forest trees occurred twenty-five or thirty years 

 ago, in the eastern part of the adjoining county of Rensselaer. 

 In a tract of timber land of two or three thousand acres it 

 was found that a large number of the spruce trees, Abies 

 nigra, had been killed. It was said at the time that "some 

 disease " had killed them, but no one felt called upon to 



