OCR Text |
Show INJURY BY PEACH LEAF CURL Cold, Wet Spring at Time Buds Open Is Favorable to Disease Damage Dam-age Underestimated. Teach leaf curl is a well-known disease dis-ease and easily recognized by the characteristic deformed condition of the leaves and young stems. Affected Affect-ed leaves are often shed from the tree, and where the attack Is severe, the shedding may be so great as to be of serious consequence. Not only so, but the loss of twigs is also sometimes some-times quite serious. The disease fungus grows within the tender young tissues, causing deformation and often death of the parts. It Is not known definitely how the fungus lives from one season to the next, but It Is known that inoculation of the peach takes place before the buds open in the spring. A cold, wet spring at the time the buds open Is favorable to the disease, as the young growing parts seem to be more easily attacked under such conditions. In such seasons severe epidemics often occur. However, the extent of the damage done by this disease Is often underestimated. under-estimated. It Is easy enough to see and estimate the direct damage, but the indirect damage is probably often equal to the direct, for the defoliation de-foliation not only prevents the tree from raising a full crop during the season of infection but also lowers its vitality to such an extent and decreases de-creases so much the amount of food produced by the leaves that fewer fruit buds are formed for the next season. Thus the damage done extends ex-tends throughout two seasons. |