GEOGRAPHIC DISTKIHUTION. 17 



Prof. N. A. Col)l),' p;itlu)lo«;ist for the iij^ricultunil dcpartnuMit of that 

 colony, has described the niuhidy (luite fully, and although he fails to 

 specify particular localities, it is probal)le that his descriptions arc 

 drawn from observations made in the colony for which he writes. He 

 says that in the most severe cases of the disease '* the fruit falls about 

 three weeks after setting, and not a peach is left to ripen. Tliis occurs 

 on trees on which the disease is chronic and severe. * * * Such 

 trees are worthless, nay, worse than wortiiless; they are a constant 

 menace to the peach trees in the neighl^orhood. The sooner they are 

 cut down and ])urned, and thus utterly destroyed, the Ijctter it will l)e 

 for the peach industry. * "'' * I have now described the disease in 

 its worst form, a form in which it is not conunon. The milder forms 

 of the disease are much more frequent." 



Peach leaf curl also prevails in Victoria, where it has been placed, 

 according to Mr. D. McAlpine,' pathologist for Victoria, among the 

 specitied diseases in the vegetable diseases bill, recently passed in that 

 colony. Mr. McAlpine also says that according to Mr. George Neilson, 

 chief inspector under the vegetation diseases act, it has been known 

 in Victoria since 1850, and affected peach trees were just as ))ad 

 then as now. Mr. McAlpine adds: "The disease is distriimted all 

 over the colony. In the cooler districts it is generally more severe 

 than in the northern and warmer districts, and it is generally more 

 prevalent in a moist and cool spring than in a dry, warm one." 



The situation in Japan has been learned through the obliging and 

 careful inc^uiries of Prof. K. Miyabe,^ of the Sapporo Agricultural 

 College. lie writes that Exoascus deforiaan>i is at present a serious 

 pest to the peach trees at Sapporo, north island, and states that his 

 attention Avas tirst called to its presence in that place some three or 

 four 3^ears since, but that there is no doubt of its existence from the 

 time of the first introduction of American peach trees, about twenty- 

 three years ago. The Japanese flowering (double red) peach trees and 

 nectarines were introduced at Sapporo by a florist about six or seven 

 years ago from Echigo Province in the northern part of the main 

 island or Honsiu. These varieties w^ere found to be attacked to some 

 extent during these few years. American varieties are now most seriously 

 affected, and many persons have been obliged to cut down their trees 

 on account of the disease. Respecting the distribution throughout 

 Japan, Professor Miyabe says: "As to the rest of Hokkaido [the 

 northern island] I found the fungus in 1890 at Mombetsu, a farming 

 village on Volcano Ba}", settled about twenty-seven years ago by the 

 people from Sendai. I could not tell w^hether the peach trees culti- 

 vated there were of American or Japanese origin. In Honsiu, or 



iCobb, Prof. N. A., paper in the Agricultural Gazette, 1892, Vol. Ill, pp. 1001-1004. 

 "" Letters dated Melbourne, Australia, July 14, 1896, and Oct. 12, 1897. 

 ^ lietter dated Sapporo, Hokkaido, Japan, Nov. 22, 1897. 



19093— No. 20 2 



