JOURNAL OF ACRICDLTOtAL RESEARCH 
DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE 
Vol. II Washington, D. C., August 15, 1914 No. 5 
FRUIT-ROT, LEAF-SPOT, AND STEM-BLIGHT OF THE 
EGGPLANT CAUSED BY PHOMOPSIS VEXANS 
By B. L. Harter, 
Pathologist , Cotton and Truck Disease and Sugar-Plant Investigations , 
Bureau of Plant Industry 
INTRODUCTION 
During the summer of 1912 when searching for eggplants (Solanum 
melongena) affected with stem-rot, supposedly caused by a Fusarium, 
Mr. G. F. Miles, then pathologist in the Office of Cotton and Truck Disease 
and Sugar-Plant Investigations, sent the writer some full-grown plants 
from New Jersey which had the appearance of wilt. The epidermis of 
the stem for 3 or 4 inches above the soil line was injured and the fibro- 
vascular bundles blackened. Cultures from the blackened bundles 
yielded in a few days not a Fusarium but an organism which, because it 
was isolated from the stem and otherwise agreed with Halsted’s descrip¬ 
tion, was regarded as Phoma solani. 
A disease of the leaf and fruit of the eggplant, commonly attributed 
to Phyllosticta hortorum Speg. has been known to plant pathologists as 
very prevalent in this country and certain parts of Europe. However, 
after some study of the organism, Smith (1905, p. 10) 1 concluded that 
the pycnospores were 2-celled, and proposed the name “Ascochyta hor - 
torum (Speg.).” Judging from reports which have appeared since that 
time, pathologists in general have not accepted the suggested change, 
but have continued to refer to the organism as Phyllosticia hortorum 
Speg. 
The writer regarded the organism on the leaf and fruit as a Phyllosticta 
and believed that Phyllosticta hortorum , Phoma solani , and Ascochyta 
hortorum were one and the same fungus. Cross-inoculations were started 
with Phoma solani Hals, and with an organism isolated in 1912 from 
diseased fruit of eggplants by Mr. A. G. Johnson, 2 of the University of 
1 Bibliographic citations in parentheses refer to "Literature cited," p. 338. 
2 The writer is also indebted to Mr. A. G. Johnson for the use of embedded material and to Dr. I. E. Melhus 
for the loan of preserved specimens. 
(331) 
Journal of Agricultural Research, 
Dept, of Agriculture, Washington, D. C. 
Vol. II, No, 5 
Aug. is, 1914 
G—28 
