48 MASSACHUSETTS HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



C. M. Hovey said that the subject had been frequently discussed 

 without discovering its cause. The disease had made its appear- 

 ance this year in Arhngton and neighboring towns, and had nearly 

 destroyed whole orchards ; and, if it continued, would much lessen 

 the value of the pear as a market fruit, and we should be obliged to 

 substitute the apple. 



W. C. Strong thought the lecture of Mr. Halsted suggestive in re- 

 gard to the blight. The plum wart is now known to be caused by 

 a fungus, and the prevailing impression as to the cause of bhght in 

 the pear tree is different from that formerly entertained ; it is also 

 believed to be caused by fungus. The theor}^ that it is caused hy 

 frozen sap is giving way to the fungus theory. 



Hervey Davis thought that good cultivation would prevent blight. 

 In his observation it had been most prevalent in low, wet, clayey 

 ground. In George Hill's grounds, at Arlington,. apple trees, es- 

 pecially the Porters, had been injured by blight similar to that of the 

 pear — some of them quite seriously. Mr. Davis had never heard 

 of blight affecting the apple in any other instance. 



John B. Moore said that some of the best cultivators had suffered 

 most. Among those at Arhngton who had suffered severel}', were 

 Mr. Crosby, whose land was low, and Mr. Fillebrown and others, 

 whose soil was sand3^ 



Josiah Crosby wished it was true that either wet or dry soil would 

 prevent bhght. 



Mr. Hovey said that western cultivators find orchards in grass 

 less subject to blight than when the land is tilled. The best pre- 

 ventive is to grow trees without manure. The frozen sap theory 

 is now exploded. Trees just imported from France have been 

 found affected. Mr. Locke, of Belmont, had suffered more than 

 any other cultivator in this vicinity. Mr. Barrj^, of Rochester, was 

 surprised that limbs affected with blight were not cut off, but Mr. 

 Locke, who began cutting off the limbs immediately on the appear- 

 ance of blight, soon found that he must cut at the bottom of the 

 tree. Cultiva-tors should be observant of the conditions under 

 which blight attacks their trees. Last summer was unusually hot — 

 the days especially. The speaker believed the blight to be caused 

 by a miasma arising from the ground, and the sun shining through 

 these exhalations caused the tree to become scorched, but we are 

 no nearer to a certain solution of the matter than we were twenty- 

 five 3'ears ago. 



