

t90T]} CURRENT LITERATURE 441 
ization is lost with age. These results agree with those of Winkler of an 
earlier date. To the definition of an “energid,” as given by Sachs, Noll 
takes exception, and calls the Siphoneae “single but multinucleate energids,”’ 
laying stress rather on the Hautschicht than on the nucleus with its dominated 
mass of protoplasm. He therefore defines the energid as a “one or many- 
nucleate plasmatic body enclosed in a definite wall.""— PHtL1p GRAEME 
WRIGHTSON 
‘‘A rhizomorphic root-rot of fruit trees’’*5 is the title of a recent bulletin 
of the Oklahoma Agricultural Experiment Station, For a number of years 
a serious root trouble, especially of the apple, has been attracting the atten- 
tion of fruit growers and botanists in Missouri, Illinois, Oklahoma, and Texas, 
as well as in other regions. This has been shown by von Schrenk and others 
to be caused, in all probability, by a hitherto unidentified rhizomorph-produc- 
ing fungus. In the present bulletin, based upon work taken up since last 
June, the disease is shown to attack other trees also than merely fruit trees, 
and is ascribed to a species of Clitocybe which is described as new under the 
name C. parasitica. This was found at the base of many diseased trees and 
was accordingly considered to be the cause of the disease. Most of the bul- 
letin is given up to a discussion of previous work on diseases of trees caused 
by agarics, to a host index of these fungi as they affect trees, and to a long 
bibliography. The discussion of the disease under consideration is really 
limited to four or five pages.— ERNsT A. BESSEY. 
THE suBjEcT of asparagus rust is one that continues to attract attention. 
A recent bulletin by F. A. Sirrine*® discusses the disease and its treatment in 
New York. All the stages of the rust are found to occur in the state. The 
variations in the distribution of the disease ascribed by some investigators to 
soil conditions seem rather to be due to the occurrence or non-occurrence of 
dews or dense fogs which furnish the moisture necessary for the germination 
of the spores. The measures usually recommended in combating this disease, 
viz., cutting and burning the affected fields early in the fall, are shown to be 
injurious to the plants and not of appreciable value in reducing the amount 
of rust next year. Using a specially devised spraying machine, which enabled 
the operators to wet all parts of the plants thoroughly, was found in two years 
trials under unfavorable conditions to effect a gain in the crop of 69.5 per cent. 
for the first year and of 47.8 per cent. for the second year. The best results 
were obtained with a Bordeaux mixture to which was added a solution of 
, E. MEAD: A rhizomorphic root-rot of fruit trees. Bulletin 49, 
car Agree Fxperiment Station. p. 32. f/s. zz. February 1901. Still- 
water, Oklahom 
*6SIRRINE, F. A.: Spraying for asparagus rust. I. Tests with resin- Bordeaux 
mixture. II. The Downs power asparagus sprayer. N. Y. Agric. Exper. St. Bull. 
no. 188, pp. 233-276. December 1900. 
