36 



It must not be forgotten that there is some loss from the fact that 

 scabby bananas, if full grown, will not keep as well as sound ones. 

 This may be easily verified by a few observations at any fruit-shop 

 where scabby bananas are on sale, or by buying a few scabby and 

 sound bananas from the same bunch and allowing them to go to decay. 



The poor quality of scabby bananas is well-known to fruiterers, 

 who as a rule are only too glad to get them off their hands. 



Remedies. 



Inasmuch as the spores of banana scab are prevented from 

 growing by the salts of copper and lime that are used as fungicides, 

 there can be no hesitation in recommending their trial for the pre- 

 vention of banana scab. Care should be exercised in their application 

 because it is not yet known to what extent the banana plant in its 

 different varieties will stand the application of these compounds. It 

 would be best to begin with the Bordeaux mixture in its weaker 

 forms. These are not likely to injure even the most tender foliage. 

 As the result of examinations and experiments I think the banana 

 will not suffer from these applications, though opportunity has failed 

 me for trials in those tropical regions where the banana is mainly 

 grown. 



The prevalence of showery weather is a drawback to the application 

 of fungicides, and it is likely that some difficulties will arise in this 

 connection. The spraying of banana plants is a comparatively easy 

 matter so far as their form is concerned. 



The applications will be most likely to be successful if made in the 

 evening. 



On the Plantation. 



When disease appears in unusual force on a plantation, it is wise to 

 give careful attention to the cultivation, and to the supply of plant-food 

 in the form of manures. It is a well-known fact that disease is more 

 destructive to plants that are poorly nourished than to those that are 

 well fed and robust. All plants are endowed with an instinct that 

 causes them to make an effort to ward off the attacks of their natural 

 enemies, and a plant that is weak will be less effective in its defence 

 than a plant that is robust. 



The above fact has led sometimes to the expression of opinions that 

 will not stand examination. I have heard people, supposedly well 

 informed, say that all that is required in the matter of crop pests is to 

 practice good culture and use the right manures, when everything else 

 will take care of itself. Unfortunately this is not so. We have so 

 changed the original nature of our cultivated varieties that in many 

 instances they have become very susceptible to their natural enemies, so 

 susceptible that unless we give especial attention to these latter the 

 crops almost invariably suffer more or less, and not infrequently fail 

 altogether. This is because we have by selection brought the plant 

 to a pitch of unnatural productiveness or earliness that leaves it 



