io8 Second Report on Economic Zoology. 
FUNGOID PESTS MISTAKEN FOR INSECT DAMAGE. 
Canker in Fruit-trees. 
I lie common disease “canker” ( Nectria ditissima ), in apple and 
other fruit trees, lias recently been much on the increase, and several 
peculiar symptoms do not seem to be known by fruit-growers, or 
recorded in the literature. The symptoms so much resemble insect 
work that it is advisable to point them out here. The cases recorded 
were referred to the chief authority on the fungoid diseases of fruit 
trees, Professor Percival, Director of the Agricultural Department of 
Reading College. Mr. Neame’s letter, reproduced here, gives an 
excellent idea of the symptoms : — “ After the bud has started 
growing, it withers off and dies. This complaint seems to occur on 
spurs. The wood dies back for a small area around each spur 
affected. A few spurs were affected last year, still more this ; three 
trees of ‘ Strumer Pippins ’ are affected at the corner of a small plot 
of thirty trees or so, those adjoining not. In another plot several 
trees are touched ; it is not, I think, due to the frost. The sap fails 
right round the branch when a spur is attacked. The infection 
of the twigs seems to have taken place shortly after the blossoms 
were fully out.” 
There is a very decided resemblance between this attack of 
“ canker ” and the working of the Pith Moth ; but a casual 
examination will show the presence of the caterpillar in the shoot 
when Pith Moth is present. 
Regarding the “ canker,” Professor Percival advises as follows : — 
It is important that all cankered shoots should be cut off and 
burnt, especially in young plantations. In old trees the cankered 
branches are often large, and it is difficult to recommend wholesale 
amputation in these cases ; but, even in these cases, it is advisable to 
get rid of the most useless branches ; they are a source of infection. 
Some varieties are much more liable to the disease than others, 
and these varieties I have found are sorts which ripen wood very late 
in the season, and hence are liable to be damaged by frost during the 
winter. 
In valuable trees it is advisable to cut away the dead cankered 
portions of the bark to healthy wood and bark, and paint the wound 
with Stockholm tar. But when the dead patch encircles, or nearly 
encircles the branch, cut it off altogether and burn, as a proper circu- 
lation of sap in the branch cannot go on long, and death takes place 
very soon after growth has begun in summer. 
