WHITE PINE W FLIT 



BY JOHN N. WASHBURNE 



Vf | iHIS is the first time I've seen your face in three 

 years," I told Posey after I had glanced around 

 his new office which the University of California 

 had placed at his disposal in the Agricultural Building. 



"You saw me last fall, didn't you?" Posey replied. 



"Not your face. You had a 'flu' mask on at that time." 



"So I did," he nodded seriously, "and do you know 

 what this office is ? these cards and files and papers and 

 specimens ? It is the 'flu' mask of the Western white pine 

 tree. There is an epidemic now rampant among the 

 Eastern white pines, a blight gradually creeping west- 

 ward, which is more fatal to 

 the five-needled pine trees 

 than was the Spanish influ- 

 enza to the human species. 

 For the White Pine Blister 

 Rust that is the name of 

 the plague is incurable once 

 it gets a hold on a pine tree. 



I thought of the California 

 sugar pine that finest tim- 

 ber tree in the world and 

 realized that it also was a 

 five-needled pine. When I 

 manifested my interest in the 

 subject, Posey, who is offi- 

 cially known as Gilbert B. 

 Posey, of the Office of Blis- 

 ter Rust Control, Bureau of 

 Plant Industry, Department 

 of Agriculture, Washington, 

 took me over the office and 

 explained some of the in- 

 tricate and thoroughgoing 

 work which he is doing for 

 the Government. 



The office has been made 

 the headquarters for theBlis- 

 ter Rust Control work of 12 

 Western States. From it 

 scouts are sent out all over 

 the vast Western territory to look for the first signs of 

 the encroaching menace. There are 3,000 linear inches 

 of cards, each card bearing detailed information of the 

 whereabouts of all white pine trees, gooseberry or currant 

 bushes which have been shipped into California, Wash- 

 ington, Oregon, etc., in the last 20 years. The gooseberry 

 and currant plants, Posey explained, carry the disease. 

 In fact, the growth (for Blister Rust is a parasitic 

 fungus) spends half of its life on a gooseberry or currant 

 plant, and wherever these bushes (called Ribes) are 

 exterminated the epidemic is at an end. 



"I am going out on a scouting trip myself in a few 

 days," Posey remarked. "A Mrs. Clemens, of the Sierra 



CULTIVATED RIBES. TOBY'S PLACE. KITTERY POINT, MAINE 



About twice natural size. Native white pine tree 12 years old, 6 feet 

 tall, 2 l / 2 inches diameter at base. Showing top portion of 14-inch girdle 

 extending from ground up. 



Club, reports signs of the plague down in the Yosemite. 

 How would you like to come along?" I snapped up this 

 proposition eagerly and made arrangements to meet him 

 the following Tuesday. , 



Nothing of interest occurred until our second day in 

 the Yosemite. The first day we spent crawling about 

 among some of the 60 varieties of wild currants and 

 gooseberries that grow in California and looking on the 

 under side of their leaves. But no sign of Cronatium 

 ribicola, which is the scientific name for White Pine Blister 

 Rust, could be found. At first I mistook every yellow- 

 tinted speck for a symptom 

 of the Rust and could scarce- 

 ly tell a gooseberry bush 

 from a Bull Thistle, but un- 

 der Posey's coaching I soon 

 began to make myself useful 

 at least, so I Believed. That 

 evening, and many subse- 

 quent evenings, we spent our 

 entire time picking prickles 

 from our hands. 



The morning of the second 

 day we made an early start 

 for Snow Creek. Although 

 statistics say that Snow Creek 

 has an elevation of only 6,500 

 feet, it is difficult to believe. 

 For the pass leading there is 

 five miles long and is nearly 

 perpendicular. All along the 

 way we came across the two 

 predominant species of Ribes 

 the flowering currant and 

 prickly gooseberry. I grew 

 to know them at sight, and 

 took particular delight in 

 discovering and pointing out 

 to Posey those plants grow- 

 ing at the top of some slip- 

 pery rock or steep, soft bank 

 of earth. By the time we reached Snow Creek in the 

 early afternoon Posey had done so much climbing that 

 he sank down exhaustedly in the place we chose for 

 our luncheon, without even glancing at the nearby goose- 

 berry bushes. 



"We'll inspect this place after chow," he said, opening 

 the bundle of lunch which, was pathetically small in com- 

 parison with our appetites. While we made the best of 

 the little we had, I asked Posey a few more questions 

 concerning this enemy of plant life against which we 

 were campaigning. 



"As nearly as can be discovered," he answered my 

 questions, "the blight originated in Siberia, spread 



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