INDIANA HOKTICULTbJtAL SOCIETY, 365 



Mr. Kingsbury: Mr. Apple spoke of uo one knowing the cause of 

 blight. Professor Burrill of the Illinois University discovered that it was 

 a bacillus. But when he discovered this I supposed he would go ahead 

 and tell us what would destroy it, but he has not; so I suppose he thinks 

 he has done his part and will leave that for the rest to do. I shall always 

 blame him for this, since having found the little pest he should have 

 found some kind of poison that would reach him and kill him. I suppose, 

 however, that he is so very small that he gets in out of reach of a liquid, 

 and I suppose the only way we can get rid of it is to cut the diseased 

 limb. off. This will rid us of it this year, but next year we will have it 



Mr. Hobbs: I think that it has been clearly proven that this is a bac- 

 terial disease. If you put this disease in the circulation of a tree, in eight 

 or nine days the disease will be found in that tree. Of course, this cutting 

 back process is all right if all the neighbors will do the same thing, but 

 if they don't you will be exposed again. To get rid of this on some trees 

 we would have to cut them down, and we don't like to do this. I would 

 like to ask Mr. Ragan if the U. S. Government has persons at work on this. 

 Do they keep them at it? 



Mr. Ragam I saj^ "Yes"; but I am not familiar with what has been 

 done. I know that this has been under investigation for several years. 

 The credit is due to Dr. Burrill of Illinois for discovering the trouble and 

 cause of blight. By the way, the first publication of this subject was 

 published by this Society. It was published in 1891, which was the first 

 publication of his theory. Dr. Arthur was also investigating this ques- 

 tion. Perhaps Mr. De Vilbiss will not be so enthusiastic another year; at 

 any rate, all he has said was well known before he was born. In regard 

 to the frozen sap theory, my father was the originator of that theory. 

 In the early 70's this Society offered a prize of $25 or $50 for the best 

 essay on the causes, prevention and remedy for blight. I didn't have much 

 to 5!ay on the subject, but I remember that I assumed that we knew very 

 little about it. and that a much better paper could be written on what we 

 did not know, and to my surprise I w^as awarded the prize. Most every- 

 thing blights, but you will almost have to except the Keifer pear. 



Mr. De Vilbiss: Forty-one years ago Mr. Rotter, near Ft. Wayne, 

 moved on his farm and planted trees of the Flemish Beauty kind in the 

 yard. The trees bliglited. I have been to see them four or five times. 

 These trees wore cut down almost to the ground— cut to an entire stump — 

 but since that time these trees have borne twenty-eight successful crops 

 of pears and have not shown a symptom of blight to last year, and I have 

 not visited them since. This tree was cut down below the forks. 



