REPORT OF THE SOCIETY 25 



THE WHITE PINE BLISTER RUST SITUATION IN QUEBEC. 



By Henri Roy, F.E., Forest Service, Quebec. 



I have accepted with pleasure the invitation extended to me by the secretary 

 of your Society to lay before you the results of our investigations last summer on 

 the "White Pine Blister Rust Situation in Quebec." 



As there has been a good deal of publicity about this disease, with which the 

 members of this society are fully acquainted, I shall confine myself to the des- 

 cription of what has been done in this province, and of what remains to be done. 

 I shall also endeavour to ascertain from the data secured up to date what may 

 be the consequences of this disease in regard to our reforestation policy. 



What Has Been Done. 



As a result of the discoveries made in the United States, especially in the 

 States of New York, Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine, in the neighbourhood 

 of our frontiers, as well as those made in Ontario and even in some scattered points 

 of our own territory, a general reconnaissance was necessary. With the co-opera- 

 tion of the Dominion Department of Agriculture, who defrayed the travelling 

 expenses of our inspectors, the Forest Service of Quebec undertook the examina- 

 tion, under the supervision of Mr. G. C. Piche. As a first step two forest engineers, 

 Mr. Gosselin and the writer, went to the Laboratory of Pathology^ at St. Catharines 

 Ont., to obtain from Mr. W. A. McCubbin additional information on the pro- 

 gress of the work in Ontario in order to benefit by the experience gained, so as to 

 make good field inspection and to collect data of value. It was impossible to send 

 out our inspectors in due time for a thorough inspection of the white pine; as a 

 matter of fact, it was not before the fifteenth of June that most of our men could 

 reach their respective districts. For this reason we have confined ourselves al- 

 most exclusively to the search for the disease upon the leaves of goosberries and 

 currants; yet we have collected enough data to map a good number of the old 

 stands and reproduction areas of white pine in the patrolled territory, and numer- 

 ous trees growing in the vicinity of gardens were duly examined. 



These investigations never disclosed the presence of the disease on the trees. 

 Moreover, we were unable to make any positive diagnosis even on those seedlings 

 shipped from the Guelph Nursery, which were suspected of scattering the 

 disease in this province after being planted here. Another inspection would be 

 necessary at the "blister" stage at Pointe du Platon, Lotbiniere county, and here 

 in St. Annes, where some of these seedlings were brought, because the rust on the 



