1744 



Canadian Forest ri/ Journal, June, 1918 



These pessimists are likewise wrong 

 when they advocate that a disease 

 may just as well be allowed to run its 

 course once it has gained entrance, 

 that to make expenditures on control 

 or eradication measures is throwing 

 good money after bad. That doctrine 

 is vicious. There are many, many 

 cases in which effective economic 

 control and preventive measures have 

 been devised, which, when applied, 

 reduce staggering losses almost to the 

 vanishing point, as with yellow fever 

 in man, and with various smuts, 

 mildews and rusts among' plants. It 

 is true that the chestnut blight ap- 

 pears to have passed beyond control 

 but it came like a bolt from a clear 

 sky; it was here and probably already 

 beyond control before we even knew^ 

 of the existence of the fungus that 

 causes it; certain it is that during the 

 two years spent in becoming ac- 

 quainted with its mode of reproduc- 

 tion, of dissemination and attack 

 the case had become hopeless. In its 

 newness to botanists, in its lightning 

 spread, and its quickness and com- 

 pleteness of destruction, the chestnut 

 blight organism stands unique cer- 

 ainly among tree-destroying fungi. 

 But the case of the blister rust of the 

 pine is different. We have long known 

 this pine rust and the vital features 

 of its life history, so that it is not 

 necessary to defer action pending the 

 discovery of further scientific data. 



Control and Prevention 



I have pointed out that we have the 

 blister rust of the pine with us — it is 

 spread practically throughout all the 

 well settled part of Southern Ontario 

 and probably Quebec. I have pro- 

 duced evidence to show that it is a 

 dangerous menace, and I have taken 

 the ground that an active campaign 

 should be waged against it. But 

 what action? 



1. The prime necessity in the 

 blister rust situation is action, and 

 our best energies should be directed 

 towards eradication and control, w^e 

 possess the knowledge essential to 

 those ends. Further research will 

 add new data of value, and so must 

 be provided for, but the foundation 

 principles governing the course of 



action to be pursued are in hand. 



2. A study of the history of this 

 disease in America attaches the full 

 blame for its introduction to the 

 imported w^hite pine stock, and it 

 likewise reveals the fact that the 

 disease occurs in the nurseries or 

 forests of Russia, Germany, Austria, 

 Denmark, Holland, Belgium, France, 

 England, and now the United States, 

 Ontario and Quebec. Therefore, an 

 absolute embargo must be maintained 

 against importations of white pine 

 nursery stock fr^m Europe and the 

 United States, and provision should 

 be made to enable Ontario and 

 Quebec to maintain a complete quar- 

 antine against such provinces as may 

 be deemed necessary, and to regulate, 

 the movement of nursery stock within 

 their own limits. As other 5-needled 

 pines are likewise susceptible to 

 blister rust (the mountain pine of the- 

 West, Pinus monticoia for example, 

 being even more so than P. strobus), 

 the embargo must embrace all 5- 

 needled pines. 



Fumigation Useless 



It may be pointed out here that 

 fumigation of stocks affected with 

 blister rust ife perfectly useless, and 

 inspection at the dock is valueless. 

 This is an example of a disease that 

 can be passed on only by an expert. 

 Looking back over the past, it cannot 

 but be regretted that the services of 

 expert plant pathologists h'ave not 

 been sooner requisitioned. The 



Dominion government, for instance, 

 took no steps in this direction prior 

 to 1909, and even yet the service is 

 undeveloped and handicapped. 



3. Blister rust has not yet been 

 found in the forests of British Colum- 

 bia, and Alberta. Therefore, a quar- 

 antine against the entrance of nur- 

 sery stock of 5-needled pines should 

 be thrown around those provinces. 

 It would seem desirable, too, that 

 some scouting should be done in 

 them, especially along the transcon- 

 tinental highways and in the fruit- 

 growing districts. 



To Plant White Pine'l 



4. It is very questionable if the 

 planting of white pine should be con- 



