257 



April 17. 1000 Rain 



April 20, 190O Rain 



May 6—8. 1900 Rain 



May 18—10. 10(M) Rain 



May 23. 1000 Rain 



May 28—20, HXtO Rain 



May :!1. 1900 Rain 



Here were heavy rains with longer or shorter periods of fair, warm 

 days between them, the thermometer standing on an average at from 

 68 degrees to 70 degrees F. 



Under conditions so favorable to the fungns. infection of the apple 

 trees was very general and the ravages of the Roestelia stage of the rust 

 were most severe. Late in July the aecidiospores began to ripen, the 

 leaves of the infected apple trees, already dist-olored by the numerous 

 yellow spots that had begun to appear dm-ing the latter part of May. now 

 grew brown and dropped off. so that by the middle of August some trees 

 were nearly bare and the gi'ound beneath them was covered with dead 

 leaves. ^lost of the young trees put forth a second growth of leaves. 

 Many of the old trees, seemingly unable to meet the unusual demand, 

 either made a feeble effort or entirely refused to put out new leaves and 

 remained bare imtil tlie following spring. Of course, some perished. We 

 recall several such trees that were cut the next summer. The apple crop 

 sufiEeretl accordingly. Almost no fruit was produced and the little that 

 did mature was knotty and worthless. While the farmers of the northern 

 part of the State, where cedars are very scarce, were selling apples at 

 fifty cents to one dollar a bushel, grocers in the city of Crawfordsville 

 sold them "three apples for five cents" and proiwrtionately per bushel. 

 This failure of the apple crop of this vicinity, while perhaps due in part to 

 the diy weather of the latter part of July, August and the first of Septem- 

 ber, was largely because of the ravages of the apple rust. Comparison of 

 this district with other apple producing sections of the country, where the 

 drought was equally severe but where the cedar does not occur, co ifirms 

 this statement. 



The general scarcity of the apple rust the following year (1901) was as 

 sti'iking as had been its general prevalence the previous season. So scarce 

 were the galls in the spring of 1901 that it was with difficulty that we 

 obtained specimens enough to supply a class of nine students. The tree 



