New York AgricutruraAL ExpertMeNnr STATION. 265 
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INVESTIGATION OF DISEASE. 
General description of the disease.—The greenhouse was 
visited at once and a striking difference found between the 
appearance of the melon plants then, and that of a week previ- 
ous. Three or more plants were much wilted. Several of their 
lower nodes and some of their internodes were oily-green in 
color with or without gum exudation, while others had passed 
beyond that stage, having all the formerly oily-green regions 
turned either a dark and gummy or dry and grey color, de- 
pending upon the relative quantity of gum present and the ex- 
tent of the cortical and sub-epidermal mycelial development 
that had taken place during the earlier stages of the disease. 
Upon looking the plants over more carefully it became very 
evident that a large percentage of them had some stage of the 
trouble at one or more of their nodal regions, more commonly 
on the lower nodes. Most of these infections were confined to 
small regions at the nodes, having seemingly originated in the 
axil of the leaf or in the crotch of a branch. Atl the smaller 
infections simply had the peculiar water-logged and oily-green 
condition; however, at those places where the disease had ex- 
tended some distance above and below the nodes, there were 
generally numerous drops of gum and pycnidia present, espe- 
cially on the lower nodal regions of the vine. See plates VII and 
VIII. In no case was an infection found to have started on an 
internode, but always either in the axil of a leaf or crotch of a 
branch. All infections observed at branchless nodes occurred 
at those having leaves which had been affected more or less 
by the red spider. At branching nodes the infection took place 
nearly exclusively in the crotch and not from the leaf axil; 
in some cases of crotch infection the leaf was normal and 
healthy. | 
Making pure cultures from diseased melon vines.—An ex- 
tensive set of pure cultures was made from various regions of 
diseased muskmelon vines by: taking bits of tissue under sterile 
conditions and transferring them to potato-agar tubes. All 
tubes containing tissue from the pith region remained sterile, 
