52 BACTERIAL DISEASES OF PLANTS 



due to Bacterium translucens var. undulosum (see Figs. 12, 14, 

 38) and citrus canker due to Bacterium citri. 



It will be of interest to mention a few of these diseases with 

 particular reference to their distribution and prevalence. 



Dutch East Indies. The tobacco disease of Sumatra and 

 Java is probably the most destructive, if the Sereh of sugar- 

 cane is not bacterial. Each of these diseases has caused enor- 

 mous losses. Each threatens or has threatened an industry. The 

 tobacco disease occurs also in the West Indies, in the United 

 States, and probably also in South Africa. If Janse's root dis- 

 ease of Erythrina, the coffee shade tree of Java, is also bacterial, 

 as he supposed, then there is another great bacterial plague 

 in that region, for hundreds of thousands of trees have died, 

 and another species has been substituted as a shade tree. The 

 brown bast disease of rubber trees (Hevea brasiliensis) , which 

 is a tumor disease of the bast of suspected bacterial origin, is 

 widespread and has attracted much attention in recent years. 

 There is also a bacterial disease of peanuts. 



West Indies. Here the most destructive disease is the bac- 

 terial bud-rot of the coconut palm, which occurs all around the 

 Caribbean, and threatens the entire destruction of a profitable 

 industry in Cuba. There is also the bacterial disease of bananas 

 and plantains, but the most wide-spread and destructive Musa 

 disease of the Western Hemisphere is the Panama disease, due 

 to Fusarium cubense EFS. 1 



Australia. Cobb's disease of sugar-cane has probably at- 

 tracted more attention in Australia than any other bacterial 

 trouble, although bacterial rots of the potato are also very 

 destructive. The cane disease in both Queensland and New 

 South Wales has in many cases destroyed the output of whole 

 plantations and greatly discouraged planters. This disease 

 occurs also in Fiji, and probably in South America. According 

 to G. F. Hill, the citrus canker occurs in the Northern Territory 

 of Australia (Bull. N. T .., Austr., 18, 1918). 



1 On this subject see papers by Elmer W. Brandes as follows: (1) Ann. Rep., 

 Porto Rico Agr. Exp. Sta. for 1916, pp. 29-31; (2) Distribution of Fusarium 

 cubense EFS, the cause of Banana wilt, 20th Report Mich. Acad. of Sciences, 

 1918, pp. 271-275; and (3) Banana wilt, Phytopathology, Sept., 1919, pp. 339- 

 389, 14 plates and 5 text figures. 



