EXPERIMENTS ON THE DECAY OF FLORIDA ORANGES. 



19 



of rot ill December. Infection with mold by means of stinkbiig 

 punctures would, of course, not be evident until the oranges had be- 

 come soft. The manner of infection would also be mysterious, be- 

 cause no evident injury could be found on the rind. Figure 1 is a 

 camera drawing giving a good general idea of these punctures and the 

 early stages of disorganization surrounding them. Possibly some of 

 the disintegration is due simply to a poison se;Creted by the mouth 

 parts of the insects. It so happened that in February, when decay 

 in the groves was very shght as compared to that occurring in Decem- 

 ber, no stinkbugs could be 

 found in the groves. 



WET WEATHER AND SPLIT- 

 TING INDUCING DECAY. 



Tlie very wet weather 

 prevailmg during practi- 

 cally the entire summer was 

 doubtless mdirectly respon- 

 sible for most of the rot, 

 not only because it favored 

 the occurrence of both 

 ammoniation and melanose 

 in great abundance, but 

 thereby also resulted in 

 many clefts in the rmd, 

 some large and some small. 

 These rind injuries, in con- 

 nection with the abundance 

 of blue-mold spores, were, 

 perhaps, the greatest im- 

 mediate cause of decay in 

 the groves, as well as of the 

 earlier jiart of the heavy 

 decay m transit. 



The creasmg and split- 

 tmg of oranges occur com- 

 monly in the fall and winter following a wet season or after a 

 wet period preceded by a drought. A drought checks the growth 

 of the fruit and hardens the rind and, if followed by good grow- 

 ing weather, ruptures may occur. However, when wet weather 

 lasts all summer, amiiKjiiiation and melanose are likely to be 

 abundant ami consequently result in many s])lits. 



The forces which actually cause the creasing and splitting liave 

 not been determuied, but have been deduced from the conditions of 



[Cir. 124] 



Img. 1.— Section of orange rind, showing gummoii.s tnl)e cr 

 rod where i)eak of insect had punctured and disintegration 

 of tissues from within outward. Magnified to aliout 26 

 diameters. Drawn liy J. Marion Shull. 



