SUMMARY AND RECOMMENDATIONS. 45 



Spaulding & von Schrenk, hitherto generally known as Glo&osporium 

 fructigenmn Berk. 



(3) This fungus until 1902 was known only in its conidial stage on 

 pomaceous fruits and grapes. The perfect or ascus stage has since 

 been discovered both in cultures on fruits and in artificial cankers on 

 the apple limbs. 



(4) The fungus attacks ripening apples during July and August, 

 and is most virulent during moist, hot summers. It is most active on 

 apples in the belt of States on the line of the Ohio River, from Virginia 

 on the Atlantic Ocean to Oklahoma in the West, and southward. (See 



% i.) 



(5) During the past summer canker-like areas were discovered on 

 apple limbs from which the disease seemed to spread. These cankers 

 generally occurred in the upper parts of trees and contained spores of 

 the bitter-rot fungus, as proved by direct inoculations into apples. 



(6) Inoculations into healthy apple limbs of bitter-rot spores from 

 pure cultures of the bitter-rot fungus (made both from diseased apples 

 and cankers) resulted in the formation of cankers similar to those 

 found in the orchards. Spores from these cankers produced the bitter 

 rot in sound fruits. This proves beyond doubt that the bitter-rot 

 fungus is the cause of the cankers on apple limbs in the orchard. 



(7) The spores of the bitter-rot fungus are washed from the cankers 

 onto the apples below the cankers. Spores are carried from tree to 

 tree by insects, and possibly by raindrops. 



(8) One of the best methods for combating this disease will consist 

 in carefully cutting out all cankers during the winter. These should 

 be burned at once. All diseased apples on the ground or in the tree 

 should be collected arid destroyed. As a further precaution, trees 

 should be sprayed with standard Bordeaux mixture at least once before 

 the buds open, and again frequently from midsummer until the fruits 

 are almost ripe. 



