148 
FLORIDA STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 
Mr. Painter.—The sulphuric acid 
remedy referred to by Mr. Phelps is a 
dilute form. Three gallons of 50 per cent. 
B. acid is diluted with seventeen gallons 
of water. 
Mr. Blackman.—I have tried a good 
many remedies, spraying, cutting away 
the wood, sulphuric acid, in fact almost 
everything I could hear of; but the only 
effective remedy I have found for this 
disease is blue stone. I inoculate the tree 
close to the ground, cutting the bark the 
same as for budding and inserting a 
piece of blue stone about as large as a 
grain of wheat. This must be done when 
the sap is up and the tree in a growing 
condition. I think that for foot rot blue 
stone is a grand panacea. In some cases 
it will scar the tree badly, but in time it 
will heal over and the tree will put on a 
most vigorous growth. I have found 
quite a good many trees that were af¬ 
fected; but in every case they were trees 
grown on low land. I have never seen a 
tree in our section that was grown on 
high pine land affected by this disease. 
Dr. Bessey.—What is the appearance 
of a tree with foot rot.^ 
Mr. Brown.—Thy become yellow and 
drop their leaves. I did not know just 
what it was at first, but I wish I might 
tell every grower who has foot rot in his 
grove that if they will put blue stone in 
the root just at the surface of the ground, 
it will surely do the trees good. 
Prof. Rolfs.—About four years ago we 
tried some experiments in treating die- 
back by inserting a small piece of blue 
stone under the bark of trees. In this 
experiment a certain number of trees 
were chosen to work upon, a number of 
trees were treated as described above and 
along side of these an ecjual number left 
untreated, careful notes as to the extent 
of dieback and the location of the lesions 
in the tree. About three months elapsed 
before it was practicable to return to take 
notes on the work, and it was found that 
treated and the untreated trees were en¬ 
tirely free from dieback. The point I 
wish to make here is, that it is absolutely 
impossible to draw a reasonable conclu¬ 
sion from any experiment unless we 
have checks upon our operations. Die¬ 
back or citrus tree indigestion, may be 
brought on by a variety of causes, even 
different trees in the same grove may 
have dieback from entirely different caus¬ 
es. The matter of first importance in 
treating dieback is to ascertain what 
caused it and then to remove the cause. 
Often times this is all that is necessary. 
The recovery of the tree may, however, 
be hastened by an application of weak 
Bordeaux mixture to the upper surface of 
the leaves. Among the most frequent 
causes of dieback I may mention plowing 
during the rainy season, applications of 
organic ammonia, hard pan or a rather 
hard sub-stratum under the tree. A tree 
that has a tendency to dieback may be set 
over into a case of dieback by pruning or 
cases or dieback have been known to be 
brought on by root pruning. In other 
cases of dieback have been known to be 
ables them to secure too much organic 
ammonia are apt to have dieback. 
Mr. Hart.—In this matter of foot rot, 
the time to cure the disease is in its early 
stages; look'out for it, examine the trees 
and if you find gum exuding at or near 
the ground, dig the dirt away and e?q)ose 
the roots, this will usually cure it. I think 
when a tree has foot rot so as it loses its 
leaves it is best to dig it up and set sour 
stock in its place that is budded eighteen 
inches above the collar. 
Mr. Frink.—I would like to hear from 
