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American Gooseberry Mildew. [may, 



There is no doubt that a spray of liver of sulphur checks 

 the disease if the spray soaks the mildew and dries upon it, 

 but unfortunately it is difficult to ensure that the somewhat 

 greasy surfaces of mildewed twigs are soaked with spray, 

 and even when the twigs have been wetted, a fall of rain 

 frequently washes off the spray before it has had time to dry. 

 In practice, therefore, it is found that spraying, to be suc- 

 cessful, must be frequent. Regular spraying is of special 

 importance when the mildew appears early in the season, 

 when young bushes in nurseries are attacked and when disease 

 breaks out in a new district. In all cases in which neigh- 

 bouring plantations are endangered by the presence of 

 mildew, spraying must be resorted to. 



As soon as active growth stops, growers should begin to 

 remove and burn every twig showing disease. This is a 

 valuable means of checking the spread of mildew in the early 

 autumn. If begun too soon, however, bushes throw out 

 many fresh shoots, and the soft tips so produced are very 

 liable to infection. After the middle of August the buds 

 would seldom "break," and in the case of old bushes grow- 

 ing on poor dry soil the removal of the tips may safely begin 

 early in July. All diseased tips must in any case be removed 

 by a date specified in the notices served under the Board's 

 American Gooseberry Mildew Order, and the sooner this can 

 be done the better for the grower himself. 



On diseased twigs in the early autumn mildew is found 

 in both the summer and winter stages. Twigs showing the 

 summer stage are highly infectious, and if they are removed 

 many adjacent bushes will be saved from disease; further, 

 the summer stage soon changes into the winter stage, so 

 that even if the grower does not remove the diseased wood 

 in August he will be forced to do so a month or two later. 

 He has, therefore, little to gain and much to lose by delaying 

 the removal of the tip^ of gooseberry shoots affected by the 

 summer stage of the disease. 



As regards twigs suffering from disease in the winter stage, 

 there is also a good reason for their early removal, for the 

 winter fruits begin to drop off the bushes and to infect the 

 soil a few weeks after they are formed. If, for example, 

 mildew attacks a crop in the middle of July, the winter fruits 



