DISEASES OF GINSENG. 53 



roots, in three years from the seed, attain greater size than they 

 often would in twenty years in the woods. 



3. The failure in many cases to provide conditions in any 

 degree approximating the natural habitat, as for example, the 

 failure to supply proper drainage that is in nature provided by the 

 forest trees whose roots constantly remove the excess of rainfalls. 



4. The crowding of a large number of plants into a small 

 area. This, in itself, is more responsible for disease epidemics 

 than perhaps any other factor. 



Most of the troubles of plants may be traced directly to one 

 of two causes, either insects, or the attacks of parasitic fungi or 

 bacteria- The pests which, at the present time, are giving ginseng 

 growers the greatest amount of trouble are, for the most part, due 

 to fungi and bacteria. The grower should fix this one fact clearly 

 in his mind, that fiuiii and hactena are plants and not insects. 

 When causing trouble in ginseng, they live as parasites, growing 

 in the substance of the tissue of the plant, taking their nourishment 

 from it and producing what we commonly call disease. These 

 parasitic plants, these disease producers, reproduce themselves by 

 seed like organs called spores. These spores are very minute 

 and are usually produced in great numbers. Unless the spores of 

 the fungus are present, there can be 7^0 fungus disease of ginseng- 

 The weather cannot cause these diseases — it can only make condi- 

 tions more favorable to the spread and development of the fungus. 

 If growers would realize at once, that in combating these diseases, 

 they have to deal with real plants, plants as real as the ginseng 

 itself, the problem would become a much easier one- To cultivate 

 any given plant successfully, the grower must know something of 

 its nature and requirements; to combat a fungus disease success- 

 fully, we must also know something of its habits and of the means 



