86 MASSACHUSETTS HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY 



of both American and Asiatic species of the genus Castanopsis 

 could probably also be used as resistant parents. Resistant 

 timber trees as well as nut trees could be produced. Many experi- 

 ments along this line are already in progress. In the long run the 

 results of breeding will probably be the most profitable outcome 

 of the struggle against the bark disease. Sooner or later we must 

 begin to breed forest trees systematically, and the chestnut is on 

 many accounts a good tree to start with. 



The Outlook. 



The chestnut bark disease is now known to be distributed 

 throughout an area bounded by the following lines: from Boston 

 through southwestern Vermont to Lake George, southwest to about 

 Pittsburgh, south to near the southern point of West Virginia, 

 thence eastward to Chesapeake Bay. Probably advance infections 

 occur outside this area, but so far none have been reported. Dur- 

 ing the coming year the disease may be expected to spread more 

 extensively than in any previous year of its history, especially 

 if the summer is moist. 



It is to be hoped that some concerted effort will be made to 

 combat the disease. Whether States which now do little or noth- 

 ing in general forestry will make any serious effort to save this one 

 species of tree remains to be seen, and for legal reasons the National 

 Government cannot undertake any work that involves the con- 

 demnation and destruction of private property. I know of no 

 case where a plant disease once prevalent has ever entirely dis- 

 appeared, though like peach yellows and pear blight and insect 

 epidemics, it may occur in waves. It is to be hoped that this 

 disease will prove the exception to the rule, and disappear from 

 some natural cause. But no such cause is now apparent; and it 

 is much more probable that the disease will, like peach yellows 

 and pear blight which were with us in the 18th century, never 

 entirely disappear except where it exterminates its host, or where 

 it is controlled by human agency. But unless methods of control 

 that we cannot now imagine are devised, no time will come when 

 it can be more easily controlled than at present. Yet we must 



