LUTHER BURBANK 



have been grafted on ordinary chestnut stocks to 

 form the basis of many chestnut orchards of the 

 southern states. 



In some cases the roots of the chinquapin have 

 been used as the foundation for grafting, in regions 

 where the ordinary chestnut does not occur. Chest- 

 nut orchards have also been started by planting the 

 seed. Reasonable success attends this method, but 

 of course it lacks the certainty of grafting. Now-a- 

 days no one attempts to start an orchard except 

 by grafting. 



Unfortunately there has developed within very 

 recent years a disease that attacks the chestnut 

 tree and invariably destroys it. The disease at 

 first appeared in the neighborhood of New York 

 City about the year 1904, and it has spread in all 

 directions each year reaching out a little farther, 

 until in 1914 there were very few chestnut trees 

 unscathed within fifty or sixty miles of the original 

 center of contagion. 



The cause of the disease is a fungus that is 

 perpetuated by minute spores that are presumably 

 carried through the air and that, when they find 

 lodgment, develop in such a way as to destroy the 

 cambium layer of the bark, presently causing the 

 death of the tree. The small twigs of a single 

 branch will often first show the influence of the 

 fungus and the leaves may die and become brown 



[110] 



