378 REPORT OF THE CONFERENCE ON GENETICS. 
ON RAISING STRAINS OF PLANTS RESISTANT TO 
FUNGUS DISEASE. 
By E. 8. Saumon, F.L.S., Hon. F.R.H.S., South-Eastern et 
@ollenar Wye, Rents 
THE time has now come—lI think it will be admitted on all sides—when 
it is imperative that attention should be paid in this country to the work 
of raising strains of cultivated plants which shall be resistant to certain 
fungus diseases. Such work, to be carried to a successful and practical 
issue, demands careful experiments carried on continuously by specialists 
over many years. It is to any large extent beyond the scope of private 
enterprise, and farmers and fruit-growers must agitate until we have some 
such institution connected with our Board of Agriculture as the Bureau 
of Plant Breeding of the U.S.A. Department of Agriculture. 
The necessity, from the practical standpoint, of the raising of plants 
resistant to fungus disease has been brought home to me very forcibly 
during the present season. I have lately visited a large number of 
orchards and plantations in Kent and Surrey where such fungus diseases 
as the following are rampant: Apple Scab or Black Spot (usicladiwm 
dendriticum Fckl.), Apple Powdery Mildew (Podosphera leucotricha Ell. 
and Kverh., Salm.), Canker (Nectria ditissima Tul.), Brown Rot (Monilia 
Fructigena Pers.), Cherry Leaf Scorch (Gnomoma erythrostoma Auersw.). 
Here the loss of many thousands of pounds has resulted from the planting 
of certain varieties of trees very susceptible to these diseases. Take the 
case of one fruit-tree, the apple; because of the injuries inflicted by such 
fungus diseases as Apple Scab or Black Spot, Apple Mildew, and Canker, 
the growing of apples is becoming in many districts a risky venture, 
owing to the lack of knowledge as to what strains of apples are resistant 
to these diseases, and to no attention having been given to the breeding 
of new strains more resistant. 
Now, in all the mixed orchards and plantations which I have Visited, 
a fact most promising for the success of the breeding of disease-resistant 
strains has always been in evidence. No matter what the fungus disease 
was, certain varieties or strains of plants have stood out as more or less 
disease-resistant. Thus, in a cherry orchard where the ‘ Waterloos’ were 
so badly attacked by the Cherry Leaf Scorch for a number of years 
consecutively that the trees were rendered quite useless, and had all to be 
regratted, the ‘Turks’ of the same age, and planted in alternate rows in 
the same orchard, stood season after season practically immune to the 
disease. Again, with Apple Scab, in plantations where certain varieties, 
such as ‘ Bismarck,’ have been attacked, on the wood, leaves, and fruit, so 
virulently that the affected trees have had to be grubbed, many other 
varieties, such as ‘Bramley’s Seedling’ and ‘Beauty of Bath,’ have 
remained immune or nearly so. Similarly with Apple Mildew. 
