142 INSECTICIDES, FUNGICIDES, AND WEED KILLERS, 



which behaves to plants Uke alkaline liquids, that is to say, it injures 

 the young buds but is without action on the adult organs. Cellulose 

 is not attacked by lime, so milk of lime may be used with impunity 

 in spraying on the different parts of adult plants, and the strength of 

 this milk of lime may be increased at will. There are, however, some 

 exceptions. Sorrel, for example, does not stand its action ; the same 

 applies to mosses and lichens, the growth of which requires much 

 moisture, are quickly destroyed by lime and especially by quick- 

 lime. 



Use against Fungi. — Alkaline substances have a decided but 

 weak action on fungi spores. This property was utilized in the be- 

 ginning of last century to destroy the spores of smut and bunt ; at that 

 time no substance fit to render the same service was yet known, and 

 time was officially recommended by the (French) Government although 

 it had not given very complete results. The chief advantage was 

 that the method did not injure the seed. However, Phillipar found 

 that after this process had been applied, and although all the grains 

 were uniformly covered with lime, the resultant crops still gave 260 

 bad ears per 1000. Girardin likewise found 112 bad ears per 1000 

 after macerating the seeds for twenty-four hours in 1 per cent milk 

 of lime. Loverdo believes that this bad result is due to the cellulose 

 nature of the exospore of the Ustilaginece which opposes a resistance 

 to the alkaline action of lime. According to tests by Kuhn the spores 

 of the bunt of wheat, Tllletia Caries, resist milk of lime for five hours, 

 but after twelve hours' immersion they have lost their vitality. Bolley 

 does not believe in lime as a disinfectant. Slaked lime in powder had 

 no appreciable action, but immersion for twenty-four hours in a milk 

 of lime gave a result especially on addition of a certain amount of 

 common salt. The following, according to Mathieu de Dombasle, 

 is the comparative result of this treatment, bad ears in 1000 carried 

 •out in various ways : Blank wheat, 486. Wheat covered with lime 

 powder, 476. Wheat moistened with milk of lime, 260. Wheat 

 immersed for twenty-four hours in milk of lime, 21. Wheat im- 

 mersed for twenty-four hours in milk of lime of 2-5 per cent strength 

 :and 4 per cent common salt, 2. The effect of lime is thus very 

 perceptible, but as soon as common salt or sulphate of soda is added 

 the effects are much more perfect. Lime is not now used alone to 

 disinfect cereal grains, but is an indispensable aid to this treatment. 

 Its chief role is to neutralize the disastrous effects of the poisonous 

 salts on the germi native capacity of the seed and to fix the anticrypto- 

 gamic products in an insoluble form on the surface of the seeds. By 

 treating with milk of lime seeds which have been steeped in a solution 

 of blue vitriol, the action of which is very injurious to the vitality of 

 the seeds, this salt is converted into copper hydrate. The latter mixed 

 with sulphate of lime forms round the grains a deposit of preservative 

 matter, so little soluble as not to be washed away by the water in the 

 soil and capable of preventing the germination of the spores adherent 

 to the surface of the grain as well as the invasion of filaments of bunt 

 which might be present in the soil. In America attempts have 

 been made to disinfect seed corn by a mixture of milk of lime and a 



