The
disease often attacks but a single branch or a small portion of a
tree. The authorities advise that everything should be cut away at
once below all evidence of infection and burned. Some of my trees
have been attacked and have recovered; others were apparently
recovering, but died a year or two later. One could theorize to
the end of a volume about the trouble. I frankly confess that I
know neither the cause nor the remedy. It seems to me that our
best resource is to comply with the general conditions of good and
healthy growth. The usual experience is that trees which are
fertilized with wood-ashes and a moderate amount of lime and salt,
rather than with stimulating manures, escape the disease. If the
ground is poor, however, and the growth feeble, barnyard manure or
its equivalent is needed as a mulch. The apple-blight is another
kindred and equally obscure disease. No better remedy is known
than to cut out the infected part at once.
In coping with insects we can act more intelligently, and
therefore successfully. We can study the characters of our
enemies, and learn their vulnerable points. The black and green
aphides, or plant-lice, are often very troublesome. They appear in
immense numbers on the young and tender shoots of trees, and by
sucking their juices check or enfeeble the growth.
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