STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 217 



REPORTS AND PAPERS 



SK?rr TO THE Secretakv for Publication, but not read at the 



Annual Meeting. 



SECOND ANNUAL REPORT OF THE STATE HORTICULTURIST. 

 TREES INJURED liY THE OCTOBER FREEZE. 



Over a very large part of the central and northern parts of the State, 

 great numbers of trees, both evergreen and deciduous, were, tlie past 

 spring, found to be incurably diseased or much damaged. The follow- 

 ing, which we published in the Prairie Farmer^ fully explains the 

 cause: 



Mr. J. R., Galesburg, HI. The box was duly received containing 

 samples of Norway Spruce, White Pine, and Red Cedar, some of which 

 you say were taken from trees twenty feet high, and which died the past 

 spring. We have devoted much time inspecting each sample, but can 

 find no evidence of disease on any of them. However, on all the young 

 shoots or branches of last year's growth, scarcely a bud had been formed 

 near the ends. On all, the large terminal bud, usually so conspicuous on 

 matured shoois, was wholly wanting, or but barely perceptible. This 

 proves to our mind that ti'ees from which these specimens were cut were 

 growing freely up to the time of the October freeze, which arrested 

 their growth. 



This it seems to have done on evergreen trees without lifting or crack- 

 ing the bark, as was common on many deciduous plants, of which tlie 

 Osage orange, in nurseries, and in some hedge rows, are examples now 

 familiar to all north of 42 degrees. We are glad to know that only a 

 comparatively small per cent, of trees were killed, and that many are 

 wounded only in the top. Possibly a hundred years may elapse before 

 causes will again combine to produce a like destruction in cither evergreens 

 or deciduous trees. 



ORANGE RUST OF THE BLACKBERRV. 



Whoever has been careful to observe has seen an occasional bush of 

 the wild blackberry with the under side of its leaves covered with a yel- 

 lowish dust, or orange rust, as it is now called. Probably but few arc 

 aware of its blighting effects on the cultivated blackberry, and much less 

 of the extent it is spreading over the country. This rust is no new thing; 

 to our certain knowledge, it has existed in the neighborhood of Alton, 

 on wild blackberries, in old fields and in the forest, for upwards of 

 twenty years. It has not, however, so far as we know, attracted n\uch 

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