83 



nut will of course bring about the decline of the fungus, uuless it 

 has already attained an unusual and lasting virulence from its 

 present aggressiveness. 



That chestnuts have in the past in our southern States suffered 

 from disease or injury of some kind yet unaccounted for, no one 

 who has looked up the literature of the subject can deny. I have 

 gathered together statements of this sort from various sources, 

 but will not take the time to present them here. From the fact 

 that no trained mycologist has studied these outbreaks in the 

 past, and from the further fact that the observers often speak 

 of them by such terms as "blight," "root rot" and so forth, and 

 did not find insects responsible, I, for one, am open to proof as 

 to their relation to Diaporthe pasasitica, despite the statement of 

 two or three observers who have recently examined trees in the 

 South, that there is no such relationship. Anyway, the chest- 

 nuts have suffered severely in these States at different times dur- 

 ing the past seventy-five years, and have been apparently 

 crowded out of the lower lands, but they still seem to be quite 

 vigorous and abundant in the higher regions of those States, 

 since the chief object of the campaign in fighting Diaporthe para- 

 sitlca seems to be to keep it north of the Potomac River in order 

 to preserve the valuable timber said to exist south of it. 



THE CHAIRMAN : We are now to be favored by hearing an 

 illustrated lecture on Chestnut Culture, the speaker being Pro- 

 fessor Nelson F. Davis, of Bucknell University, Lewisburg, Pa. 



CHESTNUT CULTURE. 



AN ILLUSTRATED LECTURE BY PROFESSOR NELSON P. DAVIS, OP 

 BUCKNELL UNIVERSITY, LEWISBURG, PA. 



Mr. Chairman, Ladies and Gentlemen: I wish to take you 

 to-night on a little trip to Irish Valley, situated near Shamokin, 

 Pa. I will take you on, this trip by a series of lantern slides. 

 I wish to show you to-night what has been done in spite of ene- 



