president's address — SECTION G. 149 



Avheat at once suited to our climatic conditions, resistant of rust, 

 and not too distasteful to the fastidious tastes of our millers, who 

 have to cater for the public in their demand for a white flour, 

 regardless of its flesh-forming- or bone-making properties. 



Dr. Cobb has also investigated the mysterious " takeall " in 

 wheat, which has long exercised the minds of our farmers. His 

 exhaustive article on the subject in the Agricultural Gazette, vol. 

 3, part 12 (December, 1892), has clearly indicated the principal 

 ■causes of the disease as known to us in New South Wales. 



During the present year Dr. Cobb has given special attention to 

 the mysterious disease that was attacking the sugar-cane on our 

 northern rivers, and the results of his microscopic investigations in 

 the cane fields and the laboratories of the Colonial Sugar Refining 

 Company enable him to suggest remedial measures for this disease, 

 and explriin to us the unsuspected cause of allied diseases in our 

 fruit trees and other crops. Though he discovered no less than 

 six different fungi and twenty species of nematodes, none of these 

 could account for the mischief reported, which turns out to be 

 associated with the presence of a microbe in the sap of the vessels 

 of the cane indicated to the eye by the exudations on freshly cut 

 surface of a yellow gummy substance. Dr. Cobb's exhaustive 

 report, now in press, shows that this disease, Avhich he calls 

 "gumming of the sugar-cane," never occurs without the presence 

 of this gummy matter, which never occurs without the microbes, 

 and is, in fact, a product of their growth. He proposes to inoculate 

 healthy cane with this microbe. Bacterium vasculorum, and the 

 results will, in due time, tie recorded. Another valuable line of 

 work now in Dr. Cobb's hands is the question of worms in sheep. 

 He has erected a laboratory at Moss Vale, and is systematically 

 examining the grasses and other fodder plants of this infected 

 district for their microscopic fauna, and compariu}; the same with 

 the larval stages of the worms parasitic in sht-ep — an entirely new 

 line of inquiry, which will result in filling up some gaps in the life 

 history of some of these worms. When the complete life history 

 of these worms is known preventive or remedial measttres will 

 suggest themselves, as was the case with trichina and hydatids. 

 He has already discovered larval forms in the sheep's dung, and 

 we may therefore look forward to the publication in due course of 

 results of practical value. 



1 )uring the past year the Chemist of the department, Mr. F. B. 

 Guthrie, has done valuable educational work. He has analysed 

 very completely eighty typical soils from different parts of the 

 colony, and has made a systematic examination of all the manures 

 offered for sale in New South Wales. From these analyses we 

 have been enabled to value on a common basis all our commercial 

 fertilisers, and the results as published in the Gazette have indicated 

 to those interested how they can most cheaply and effectively 

 manure their crops and improve their soils. The result has been 



