ABOUT FRUITS, FLOWERS AND FARMING. 393 



THE BLIGHT IN THE PEAR-TREE.* 

 ITS CAUSE AND A REMEDY FOR IT. 



THE year 1844 will long be remembered for the exten 

 sive ravages of that disease hitherto denominated fire-blight. 

 Beginning at the Atlantic coast, we have heard of it in 

 Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia, Ohio, Kentucky, Indi 

 ana, and as far as Tennessee ; and it is probable that it has 

 been felt in every fruit-growing State in the Union where 

 the season of 1843 was the same as that west of the Alle- 

 ghany range, namely, cold in spring, dry throughout the 

 summer, and a wet and warm fall, with early and sudden 

 winter. 



In Indiana and Ohio the blight has prevailed to such an 

 extent as to spread dismay among cultivators ; destroying 

 entire collections taking half the trees in large orchards 

 affecting both young and old trees, whether grafted or 

 eeedings in soils of every kind. Many have seen the labor 

 and fond hope of years cut off, in one season, by an invisible 

 destroyer, against which none could guard ; because, in the 

 conflicting opinions, none were certain whether the disease 

 was atmospheric, insect or chemical. 



I shall now proceed to describe tbat blight known in the 

 western States (without pretending to identify it with the 

 blight known in New York and New England), to examine 

 the theories proposed for its causation, and to present what 

 now seems to me the true cause. 



I. DESCRIPTION. Although the signs of it, as will appear 

 in the sequel, may be detected long before the leaves put 

 out in the spring, yet its full effects do not begin to appear 

 until May, or if the spring be backward, until June. On 

 the wood of the last year will be found a point where the 



* Read before the Indiana Horticultural Society, and communicated by 

 Mr. Beecher to Hovey s Magazine of Horticulture, December, 1844. 



17* 



