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THE GENESEE FAKMER. 



GRAPE VINE MALADY. 



BY W. B. LE COUTEULX, OF BLACK ROCK, N. T. 



The disease described in the following Report, wliicli I translate, lias made its appear- 

 ance upon my imported vines this year for the first time, particularly iJpon the Chasselas ; 

 but my Isabella vines have also suftered more or less from the eifects of it. All my 

 vines are planted in espaliers, and not in a hot-house, all to the south or east ; and these 

 last suftered less than the first. All the new limbs have black spots, and no doubt will 

 have to be cut. 



" Report made to the Central Agricultural Society of Paris, Franx-e, upon the Malady ■which 

 NOW EXISTS UPON Grape Vines. — Tliis malady upon the grape vine appeared for the first time in 

 Ensjland in 1845. It was well observed and described by a gardener from Margate, INIr. Tucker. 

 But in England, as in all countries which are cold and foggy, the vine being cultivated only in liot- 

 houses, lieated by steam, can produce but a forced grape of inferior quality ; still much valued by 

 their inhabitants, unable to procure any other. One was apt to think that this disease having taken 

 place on vines so kept in hot-houses, was but an accident from vegetation and the result of an irreg- 

 ular culture under exceptionable conditions : but it is not so ; for from the hot-house it spread to the 

 garden, and from the garden to the fields. 



" This disease made its first appearance in the neighborhood of Paris in 1849. It was first remarked 

 on the vines planted in espaliers, from which it was not long in spreading to all the surrounding 

 country. 



" In the origin the disease offered nothing alarming ; but in the following year it acquired a certam 

 o-ravity, acting severely upon the vines of the Luxembourg and those of Versailles. I had an oppor- 

 tunity to watch its progress upon a vine in espalier, planted toward the south, in one of the gardens 

 of the Hotel of the Invalids in Paris. But this year (1851) creates more uneasiness, as the circle of 

 action of that dreadful scourge is enlarging considerably ; from which it follows that all that zone 

 comprising the east and the west of Paris is invaded by it, and that it seems now to take its course 

 toward the south. 



" From all reports received upon the nature of that disease, and which have been read to the 

 Societv in former meetings, it results that at Alfort and at Charenton the vines havesadly suflered 

 from the effects of it; so much so, that even the branches have been injured, and it is feared they 

 will have to be cut near the ground. The news from Grenoble informs us that the disease made its 

 appearance at La Tronche, and that it is not without some importance. Other information from 

 Foutainebleau says that the Chasselas is invaded by the same malady, and that great fears are enter- 

 tained for the crop. 



" This new disease has been named Todium Tuckari, from Mr. Tucker, who was the first pei-son 

 that discovered and described it. In the vineyards around Paris it is known under the name of White 

 disease, on account of its showing itself by a light white dust covering the leaves; and which, almost 

 imperceptible at first, increases so rapidly that it can soon be seen with the naked eye. On touching 

 it, it resists like a moss whose roots should be implanted in the parenchyma of the leaves.^ On smel- 

 ling- it, it emits a strong smell of mushrooms. Seen with a magnifying glass, its aspect is that of a 

 new risino- moss, which seems to be incrustated in the follicles of the tissues, aspiring from it all the 

 nourishin" sugar. So deprived of its sap, the leaf curls up, dries, and drops. But that white dust, 

 v.'hich is no other thing than a mushroom, goes from the leaf to the young sprouts, which it dries u]\ 

 and then goes through the central line to the grape, filling all the interstices between the grains, 

 shining on all sides upon the pedicles, enveloping the grain and impregnating it with its innumerable 

 microscopic radicles. -it,/. 



" When this malady makes its invasion before the blooming of the grape, the grains hardly formed 

 wither and dry up. Contrarily, when it appears after the blooming, the grains, suddenly deprived 

 of their sap, take a tarnished color, crack, and show the seeds in the interior, dying before maturity. 

 But when it liappens (and it has been until now the greatest number of cases) that the grains reach 

 safely one half of their growth, they generally complete their maturity ; and one may then depend 

 on gathering half a crop'j but of spotted, bitter, and even unwholesome grapes. 



''Many proceedings have been employed by the gardeners around Paris, to attenuate the evil. 

 Tliey have tried to take off the white substance— -that is to say, the mushroom— from the leaves by 

 brushino- ; but besides its being impracticable upon a large scale, it could not remove from the leaves 

 the parasite which had invaded them. They have also tried to wash it off with pure water ; then 

 with an addition of lime or alum ; but it proved ineftectuaL 



" At the Agronomique Institute of Versailles, powdered sulphur was added to water and thrown 

 on the vines with the gardener's pump ; the grapes have been washed with pure water, and then 

 sulphur in powder blown upon them with a bellows: but all without success. 



" New experiments are now tried in all parts of France where the vine is cultivated ; and it is to 

 be hoped that a successful remedy will be found to put a stop to this dreadful disease, " 



