848 REPORT OF THE COMMISSIONER OF AGRICULTURE, ; 
3.—_BITTER-ROT OF APPLES. 
Gleosporium fructigenum, Berk, ? 
(Plate III.) 
(a) GENERAL REMARKS, EXTENT, AND SEVERITY. 
During the past year a number of fruit-growers in the Southwest 
have complained of a rot of the Apple which was seriously affecting - 
their crops. In parts of Arkansas the disease was said to be very 
injurious, frequently causing the entire destruction of the fruit. 
Mr. J. W. Beach, a successful fruit-grower of Batavia, Boone 
County, Ark., relates his experience with this disease as follows: 
I came to this county in 1884, and that season there were four trees in my old 
orchard affected, two of which were Fameuse. The man from whom I purchased 
my place told me that the Fameuse had always been subject to the rot. For the 
last three years the disease has steadily increased, so that this year (1887) my old 
orchard of 75 trees will not yield 25 bushels of sound apples. I have talked with 
a great many orchardists in regard to the trouble, and they all agree in the opinion 
that the old orchards are the most affected. I have lately visited fine orchards of 
hundreds of trees, but in no case did I find the fruit perfect; all were more or less 
diseased. 
From the information received it appears that the rot usually be- 
gins early in the summer and increases as the season advances. When 
once affected the fruit never recovers, but continues to decay until 
completely destroyed. 
The rot may develop after the apples are harvested and stored for 
the winter, and also spread from the diseased to the healthy fruit by 
contact. All varieties are alike attacked, and the development of the 
malady is not influenced by the system of cultivation pursued or by 
the character of the soil. At Denison, Tex., our attention was called 
to this disease through the large amount of fruit destroyed by it. It 
begun while the apples were yet upon the tree, and in some cases the 
brown patches on the fruit suggested the idea that they might result 
from sun scald, but an examination of the diseased tissues, as well as 
subsequent developments, point to another cause, 
This rot is caused by a fungus that belongs to a group the mem- 
bers of which are frequently quite destructive, one species causing 
the socalled anthracnose of the vine, while another attacks the 
raspberry and blackberry. The members of the group as a whole, 
are known to botanists as Hyalosporce, and the species which causes 
the Apple rot we are describing, we thinkis Gleosporium fructigenum, 
Berk. So faras we have been able to discover, the first account of this 
fungus was published in the Gardener’s Chronicle by the Rey. M. J. 
Berkley, more than thirty years ago.* Several subsequent writers 
on plant diseases have briefly referred to it. 
Serious and wide-spread as this disease seems to be in certain parts 
of the United States, we do not find in the works of our mycologists 
any record of the fungus that causes it. 
(6) EXTERNAL CHARACTERS. 
The affected apple at first shows one or more black or, usually, 
brownish spots on any part of the surface; as these gradually enlarge 
their shape becomes more or less circular and their borders somewhat 
* Gardener’s Chronicle, 1856, page 245. 
