REPORT OF THE STATE BOTANIST I9IO 7 



may be found under the name C li t o c y b e d e a 1 b a t a s u d o- 

 r i f i c a , in the chapter entitled '' Remarks and observations." 



Having been informed that the raspberry patches of the fruit 

 growers in the vicinity of Marlboro, Ulster county, were suffering 

 from disease and wishing to know the cause of it, a visit was made 

 to that place in July. An examination of the diseased canes showed 

 that they were suffering from an attack of a parasitic fungus whose 

 botanical name is Sphaerella rubina Pk. The fruiting 

 canes develop their leaves and flowers as usual but before the 

 fruit ripens it withers and dries on the branches. The dryness of 

 the season and an attack of " red spider " on the foliage were 

 apparently contributing causes of the failure of the crop and the 

 loss was severe. The diseased canes bore patches of the fungus. 

 It matures its spores early in the season. In the type specimens 

 they were found in May. The young canes showed brown or 

 blackish patches one or two inches long on the lower part. In 

 some cases they were near the ground, thereby indicating a prob- 

 able, infection while they were but a few inches tall. These spots 

 had not yet developed their perithecia or spore cases but doubtless 

 would toward the end of the season and next spring be ready to 

 shed their spores and renew the species in the succeeding crop of 

 young canes. Theoretically the disease should be prevented by 

 spraying the young canes with a good fungicide like Bordeaux 

 mixture or lime sulfur mixture, but it would be necessary to give 

 the first spraying when the young shoots are only three or four 

 inches high. This should be repeated once a week till the canes of 

 the previous year begin to blossom. 



While there, my attention was called to a diseased chestnut tree. 

 It was a young tree with sickly looking foliage and a few dead 

 branches. It was suffering from the chestnut bark disease caused 

 by a parasitic bark fungus. Both branches and trunk were affected 

 by the fungus, the latter but a few feet above the ground. It 

 was my first opportunity to see a tree affected by this disease 

 about which much that appears to me to be overdrawn and need- 

 lessly alarming has recently been published in magazines and news- 

 papers. Remarks concerning its distribution in our State are 

 given under the name Valsonectria parasitica (Murr.) 

 Rehm in the chapter headed " Remarks and observations." 



In 1899 a census of the flowering plants and ferns of Bonaparte 

 swamp was taken and a list of the species was published in tlic 

 report of the Botanist for that year. The swamp is a large one 



