MONTANA STATE BOARD OF HORTICT LTIJRE 15 



Malnutrition : This is a oreneral term which is often overworked, 

 but when orchards begin to show yellow leaves early in the summer and 

 when they make only a very short wood grow^th this condition may safe- 

 ly be attributed to lack of proper plant food in the soil, provided suffi- 

 cient water has been applied. This condition is especially noticeable in 

 soils which are very shallow. Wherever it is possible fertilizers should 

 be added to these soils either in the form of animal manures' or cover 

 crops of some leguminous plants. IMany of the diseases such as root 

 gall or root rot may give an appearance similar to trees which are 

 growing in a poor soil, but these conditions should not be easily con- 

 fused, for poorly nourished trees are quite uniformly yellow within 

 the entire orchard, while trees affected with disease will occur among 

 trees which may be entirely healthy and vigorous. 



Brown Bark Spot : This is a condition which several years ago 

 caused a great deal of worry to the orchardist, especially in the upper 

 part of the Bitter Root valley and on the west shore of Flathead Lake. 

 The State Experiment Station at Bozeman has done considerable ex- 

 perimental work on this condition, but so far have not been able to 

 attribute its occurrence to any specific disease organism. This con- 

 dition, known as brown bark spot, has during the past couple of years 

 / rather subsided and is not now spreading to any extent and it is even 

 disappearing in some orchards where it prevailed some years ago. 



Advisory Work 



During the past two years the inspectors in the fruit growing 

 districts have spent a large amount of their time in personal and ad- 

 visory work among the growers. This has been the most important 

 phase of the work of the State Board of Horticulture in disseminating 

 horticultural knowledge. Each inspector makes an effort to visit every 

 orchard in his district and at that time to give the grower what help 

 he can with respect to the various orchard operations. Beginning 

 with the early orchard work in the spring the inspector visits the 

 orchards and gives instructions in pruning where such seems to be 

 necessary. The pruning work lasts until about spraying time when 

 the efforts of the inspector are directed strenuously toward the se- 

 curing of proper spraying practices in all the orchards in his district. 

 As the spray machine is the most important implement used in con- 

 nection with the control of pests and diseases, it is needless to say 



