SEVENTEENTH ANNUAL MEETING. 63 



begin to show signs of yellowing when the fruit is prematur- 

 ing. On the other hand, trees sometimes may be covered with 

 prematured fruit and the leaves not only fail to turn yellow, 

 but may be actually darker green in color than adjacent nor- 

 mal trees. I have seen a good many cases where the fruit 

 was premature, often every peach on the tree, enlarged, red- 

 spotted and premature and the leaves darker green than nor- 

 mal. The twig growth is usually shorter on such trees. They 

 behave like trees which have been pinched back or summer 

 pruned. 



Another leaf symptom consists in the drooping and rolling 

 upward of the leaves on affected trees. This rolling and 

 drooping, which is an old well-known symptom, has become a 

 prominent feature of the yellows over much of the Eastern 

 States during the past season. This symptom has been con- 

 sidered more particularly applicable to the little peach disease, 

 but was an invariable symptom of the yellows last year from 

 Connecticut to Virginia. In 1906 in Maryland and Virginia 

 the conspicuous thing in the fall of the year was the amount 

 of sprouting growth on the diseased trees. This past season 

 there was very little of the sprouting growth, while this pe- 

 culiar symptom was greatly exaggerated. Some years normal 

 peach trees drop their leaves in the fall while they are still 

 perfectly green and flat or nearly so, or they may be trans- 

 formed by autumn coloration before shedding. Some varieties 

 have much more of a tendency to curl, such as the Crawford, 

 Conklin, etc., than others. This curling without other 

 change is the conspicuous new feature of the yellows. It cer- 

 tainly cannot be regarded as at all reliable, inasmuch as it 

 may be found occurring abundantly at the close of the season 

 in orchards plainly not affected by the yellows. In other 

 words, the yellows trees rolled and prematured their leaves 

 ahead of the normal ones, although last season many undoubt- 

 edly healthy trees assumed this peculiar form in their foliage 

 before it dropped. Trees affected by drowning or by frost 

 girdling have been observed by me for several years to have 

 this peculiar symptom. 



