Chapter VI 



EARLY STUDIES IN BACTERIAL PLANT DISEASES. FUSARIUM DISEASES 

 OF PLANTS, FLORIDA AND CALIFORNIA LABORATORIES 



ON MAY 7, 1892, James W. Tourney, botanist and entomol: 

 ogist of the Arizona Agricultural College and Experiment 

 Station at Tucson, sent Smith " a small box containing cherry and 

 peach leaves which show[ed} peculiar circular holes and inden- 

 tations. Rose, peach, apricot, cherry and some of our native shrubs 

 and trees," said Toumey in his accompanying letter, 



are affected in a similar manner. On some trees, this disease, if it may be 

 called such, is so bad that nothing is left of the leaves but midrib. The 

 tissue in affected leaves withers and dies in narrow circular streaks and 

 soon the intervening tissue or part of leaf drops out. The remainder of 

 leaf in all cases apparently is perfectly healthy. Whether this condition is 

 brought about by unfavorable conditions of growth, I do not know. J 

 would be pleased for any information in regard to it that you can give. 



Toumey had graduated in science from Michigan Agricultural 

 College in 1889, and before obtaining his master's degree from 

 the same institution in 1895, spent part of the year 1893 as a 

 special student at Harvard. In his later prepared bulletin 33 of 

 the Arizona Agricultural Experiment Station, "An Inquiry into 

 the Cause and Nature of Crown-Gall," ^ he stated that his atten- 

 tion was first called to another disease variously known as crown- 

 gall, crown-knot, root knot, root galls, etc., in 1893 from " many 

 observations . . . made in infested orchards in the Salt River 

 Valley." He examined the disease, its development, and possible 

 corrective measures. The next year was published his preliminary 

 report," the same year Smith's general account of " Stem and Root 

 Tumors " ^ from his " Field Notes, 1892 " reached mycologists 

 and pathologists. Smith said in part: 



* April 13, 1900, Published accounts relating to crown-gall, 8. 



' Bull. 12 Ariz. Agric. Exp't Sta., 1894. 



^ Jour. Myc. 7(4): 376-377, Aug. 15, 1894. See also Bulletin of the Torrey 

 Botanical Club 20: 363 (proc. Botanical Club, American Assoc. Adv. Sci., Madison 

 meet., August 18-22, 1893, abstract or statement by Smith concerning his preliminary 

 microscopic examinations). 



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