200 AGRICULTURAL APPROPRL\TIOX BILL, K>24. 



the rust had just simpl v been blown to that side of the grain from those 

 barberry bushes, which were about a half mile away from this wheat 

 field, and had attacked that side of the stem. It was a perfectly clear 

 situation, and in Wales I became absolutely convinced that black-stem 

 rust does not exist except where there are common barberry bushes. 



I found the same thing true in France. I made a long trip through 

 France, and I could not find any black-stem rust at all until I went 

 up into the Alps Mountains, where there are immense numbers of 

 barberries. I have never seen barberries more heavih' rusted than 

 these were, and this at a time when you could not find rust anywhere 

 else in France. We stopped at a little town called Briancon, where 

 they grow quite a bit of rye. There they have not eradicated the 

 barberry bushes. There I saw a peasant woman, and I asked her 

 whether they had any black-stem rust. She said they had. I asked 

 her whether she knew what rust was, and she said she certainly did, 

 that she was very familiar wdth it. I asked her whether she knew 

 where it came from, and she said she did, that it came from the bar- 

 beiT}^ bushes. I asked her whether they ever suffered much damage 

 from it, and she said they always did. I asked her if it (Hd any dam- 

 age to wheat, and she replied it did not, for the reason that they do 

 not grow any wheat there, because it always rusts so badly they can 

 not grow it. I asked her why they did not dig out the barberry 

 bushes, and her answer was that they make a very nice preserve out 

 of those berries, and their rye does not amount to very much an^^•ay. 

 But the important thing is that in all of the great wheat-gi'owing 

 areas of France there was not a single bit of black-stem rust, while 

 in the Alps Mountains and in the Jura Mountains, where there are 

 a great many barberries, there was a tremendous amount of rust. 



Even down in Spain, where one would expect the summer stage of 

 rust to live over the winter and to be indepon(kMil of the barl)erry, 

 it apparently is not independent of the l)arl)orry, because there they 

 have practically no black stem rust or very little black stem rust ex- 

 cept in the mountains where there are a great many barbei'rv l^ushes. 

 All of the people with whom I talked in Spain said that the rust ap- 

 peared earlier on the giain and grass near the barberry bushes, and 

 that the rust seldom did any damage except in the immediate neigh- 

 borhood of the barberry bushes or in the regions where there are ' 

 many barberry bushes. 



I talked with Italian agronomists and plant patholoo;ists and 

 made observations myself. They told me that in the southern part 

 of Italy, where there are no barberry ])ushes. the black stem rust did 

 not amount to anything, but that in the northern part of the country, 

 where there are a great many ]>arberry bushes, tlie i)lack stem rust 

 does a lot of damage. There was one interesting case of barberry 

 eradication about (iO miles southeast of Rome. In 1914 they found 

 an outbreak of black stem rust; they looked the situation over and 

 found some barberries. They removed about half of them the same 

 year, and the next year there was no rust near the place from which 

 the barberries had been remov(>d, but there was rust near the nMuain- 

 ing barb(>rrv bushes. They took out the r(>niainiiig barlxM-ry bushes, 

 and the next year the rust failed to develop and since then they have i 

 hav(! had no rust iii thai paiMicular icgion. | 



In .Vustria-Ilungarv Ihe farmers and others told me that they had , 

 not seen common barberry bushes since about 1S9S, or before that , 



I 





