FUSARIUM RESISTANT CABBAGE: PROGRESS WITH 
SECOND EARLY VARIETIES 1 
By L. R. Jones, Professor of Plant Pathology, University of Wisconsin; J. C. 
Walker, Pathologist, and John Monteith, Jr., Assistant Pathologist, Office 
of Cotton, Truck, and Forage Crop Disease Investigations, Bureau of Plant 
Industry, United States Department of Agriculture 
INTRODUCTION 
About 25 years ago E. F. Smith (7), 2 
while studying the bacterial black-rot 
disease of cabbage, recorded another 
disease which he correctly diagnosed as 
caused by a vascular Fusarium. In 
this connection he pointed out the 
serious danger from this and similar 
soil-borne fusarial diseases. Appar¬ 
ently this disease was not then wide¬ 
spread in its occurrence and little fur¬ 
ther attention was given to it until 
about 10 years later. Then Harter 
(2) noted its serious development in 
the southeastern States and Manns ( 6 ) 
reported it as becoming highly de¬ 
structive in the intensive cabbage¬ 
growing districts of Ohio. It was 
about this time that the senior writer 
learned that the cabbage growers along 
the shores of Lake Michigan from Mil¬ 
waukee southward into the environs of 
Chicago were being forced out of the 
cabbage industry because of the rapidly 
increasing inroads of this “yellows' 7 
disease and sent a culture of the fungus 
to Wollenweber {10), who described 
and named the species Fusarium 
conglutinans. 
Since then evidence has rapidly 
accumulated to show that this parasite 
has become established across the 
continent to California on the west and 
to the Gulf States on the south. Its 
occurrence from Iowa and southern 
Minnesota across the northern States 
to southern New York has been a 
matter of frequent report for several 
years. It was found by Walker to be 
destructive near Mobile, Ala.,*in 1918, 
and in 1923 H. D. Barker, in corre¬ 
spondence, reported it as serious in 
central Mississippi. In 1922 Monteith 
observed it on kale at Santa Rosa, 
Calif.; in 1923 Walker observed it in the 
Greeley district of Colorado, causing a 
25 per cent loss in one field; and 
Stokdyk (8) has reported it from 
Kansas. 
Moreover, in accord with Smith’s 
warning, wherever introduced it has 
soon become the most seriously destruc¬ 
tive of all cabbage diseases in those 
regions where climatic conditions favor 
its development. It has, however, 
been further shown (1, 8, 9) that this 
disease, like most of those caused by 
vascular Fusaria, is distinctly limited 
by soil-temperature relations. It is a 
high-temperature parasite, and since 
the invasion occurs only through the 
root system when the soil temperature 
remains below about 17° C. its attacks 
are inhibited, whereas above this tem¬ 
perature the severity of the disease 
increases rapidly with rise in tempera¬ 
ture for about 10°. These temperature 
influences are especially potent in the 
northern States during the earlier 
growth of the plant when it is relatively 
shallow-rooted, the periods of most 
serious susceptibility being (a) the 
seedling stage and (6) the time immedi¬ 
ately following transplantation. 
Previous publications {8, Jf) have 
demonstrated the practicability of con¬ 
trolling this disease through the selec¬ 
tion of disease-resisting strains and 
have recorded the earlier successes with 
certain of these as used locally in the 
vicinity of Racine, Wis., and Chicago, 
Ill. More recent developments have 
confirmed the earlier judgments as to 
the futility of turning to any other 
method of control of the cabbage 
Fusarium disease. At the same time 
they have indicated the pressing and 
widespread national importance of de¬ 
veloping and of securing the adequate 
maintenance of disease-resisting strains. 
At first it seemed that perhaps two or 
three such strains of different types 
would meet the outstanding needs. 
1 Received for publication July 29, 1924; issued August, 1925. The writers wish to acknowledge the as¬ 
sistance of W. B. Tisdale, now of the Florida experiment station, who was associated with this work from 
1919 to 1922, and of E. C. Tims, who assisted in the conducting of field trials in 1922 and 1923 and has con¬ 
ducted other investigations of the problem to be reported in an independent publication entitled, “ Studies 
on the Fusarium Disease of Cabbage” (Ph. D. thesis, Univ. of Wis., 1924). Appreciation is also expressed 
to the National Kraut Packers’ Association for generous financial support, and to Martin Meeter, chairman 
of the seed committee of that association, for his hearty cooperation. 
2 Reference is made by number (italic) to “Literature cited,” p. 1034. 
Journal of Agricultural Research, Vol. XXX, No. 11 
Washington, D. C. June 1, 1925 
Key No. G-471 
52243—25f-3 
(1027) 
