86 



Ergot — Inoculation of cheese, SfC. 



Vol. VIIL 



For the Farmers' Cabinet. 

 Ergot— Inoculation of cheese, &c. 



At the last December meeting of tlie 

 Linnsan Society in London, A. H. Hassell, 

 Esq., exhibited an apple in which decay had 

 been artificially induced, by inoculating it 

 with decayed matter from another apple, 

 containing filaments of entophytal Fungi. 

 This reminds me of a mode of inoculating 

 a new cheese, and communicating to it the 

 flavour and appearance of an old one, tliat 

 was mentioned some years ago by the Sec- 

 retary of the Royal Society of Edinburg. 

 It may readily be done by inserting into the 

 new cheese, portions of an old one contain- 

 ing blue mould. The common cheese taster 

 offers a ready instrument for effecting the 

 purpose. Ten, or a dozen of the rolls it ex- 

 tracts from the old cheese may be placed in 

 the new one, so as to disseminate the germ 

 of the blue mould all over the cheese. A 

 half of a cheese may be treated in this way, 

 and the other half left in its natural state ; 

 and those who prefer the old to the new, 

 will be struck with the superiority of the 

 one, over tlie other. A cheese treated in 

 this way, should be covered from the air for 

 a few weeJ^s, when it will be scarcely dis 

 tinguishable from a genuine old cheese. 



At the same meeting, as we learn from a 

 late Number of the "Annals and Magazine 

 of Natural History," Edwin John Quekett, 

 Esq., F. L. S., conmiunicated some observa 

 tions and experiments on the nature of the 

 Ergot* of grasses, that are very curious and 

 interesting, and which I send for the Cabi- 

 net. The Ergot on wheat is of rare occur- 

 rence here — I never saw it on barley: on 

 rye, it is not unfrequently quite injurious to 

 the crop. M. 



In March, 1840, twelve healthy grains ofj 

 rye, of wheat, and of barley, were placed 

 in a shallow glass vessel, containing a suflS- 



* Rennie, in his Alphabet of Botany, speaks of the 

 Ergot insect, as a four-winged fly, similar to the ap/iis 

 of the rose, but one-half smaller, and darker (jreen, 

 with black markings. He says he ascertained in nu- 

 merous instances, in 1832, that the er§ot of rye, Secalc 

 cornutum, is a morbid enlargement of the grain, caused 

 bv the puncture of this insect, and not, as it is repre- 

 sented by some, a fungus, Spermadia clavus. Loudon, 

 however, in his Encyclopedia of Plants, places the er- 

 got of rye, in the body of his work, among the fungi, 

 and speaks of it in the second part, as a. parasitic fun- 

 gus. Brande, also recognises it as a fungus, possess- 

 ins important medical properties. This is a curious 

 subject for the naturalist. Fries, one of the best wri- 

 ters on Fungi, considprs the lowest of them to bear 

 the same relation to plants, that Entozoa do to ani- 

 mals.— Ed. 



cient quantity of distilled water to moisten 

 them, and covered with a glass shade. When 

 germination commenced, an ergot of wheat 

 of the preceding year, was immersed in the 

 water, the sporidia on its surface were de- 

 tached, and the ergot itself was then re- 

 moved. The same experiment was per- 

 formed with sporidia obtained from an ergot 

 of Elymus sabulosus. Several days after- 

 wards, when the leaves had attained a 

 length of three or four inches, the young 

 plants were conveyed into the country and 

 planted side by side in a garden. At the 

 period of harvest, there remained alive only 

 four plants of the rye, one of which had 

 been infected from the ergot of Elymus, 

 and the remaining three from that of wheat, 

 — three of the barley, and four of the wheat. 

 Of the rye, scarcely a single ear produced 

 healthy grains, the paleae being generally 

 quite empty; but nine of the ears contained 

 ergots, some furnishing only a single speci- 

 men, and others as many as six. The ears 

 of the barley were filled with healthy grains, 

 and only one apparently diseased grain was 

 detected; while in the wheat the ears were 

 full and without disease. 



As in these experiments no grains from 

 the same sample were sown which had not 

 been subjected to the influence of the spo- 

 ridia of the fungus, Mr. Quekett made in 

 the following autumn another experiment, 

 with the view of supplying this deficiency. 

 Twelve grains of rye, of wheat, and of bar- 

 ley, were again made to germinate under 

 similar circumstances to the last, and the 

 sporidia obtained from the surface of one of 

 the ergots of rye produced in the first ex- 

 periment, were diftused in the water in 

 [which they grew. These were planted in 

 October, on the same estate, but not within 

 [half a mile of the former spot; and twelve 

 healthy grains of each kind, which had been 

 carefully kept apart from the others, were 

 planted in the same locality. Very few of 

 the plants arrived at maturity, and in Au- 

 gust last, there remained of the infected 

 plants, only two of rye, two of wheat, and 

 one of barley; and of the uninfected plants, 

 one of each kind. On each of the plants of 

 rye which had been subjected to the influ- 

 ence of the sporidia, an ergot was disco- 

 vered, and the ears as before, were almost 

 entirely devoid of healthy grains; while the 

 plants of wheat and barley subjected to the 

 same influence, produced perfect ears and 

 healthy grains. The three plants of rye, 

 wheat, and barley, planted at the same time, 

 without exposure to the sporidia of the fun- 

 gus, presented no unhealthy appearance. 



Mr. Quekett argues, that all the grains 

 of rye subjected, during germination, to the 



