Excerpt from Bitter Rot of Apples: Botanical Investigations Department of Agriculture. Some direct, successful studies were made during the last quarter of the Nineteenth Century, and certain other important discoveries found afterward helpful had been made, but the knowledge which is at this date relied upon as a guide in the prevention of these losses has mainly resulted from investiga tions undertaken since the beginning of the year 1900. Thanks to these studies and experiments, it may now be said that what for merly seemed incomprehensible is easily understandable. The cause of the difficulty has been ascertained and a fungus identified as that cause. The time has gone by for any one to cavil in regard to the application of the word cause so used. It is true that the parasite must have conditions suited to itself, but conditions are not active agents. It is the fungus as the active agent working under permis sible conditions of susceptible fruits and of heat and moisture which must be charged, if there is to be such a charge, with the cause of the effects witnessed. Combative measures to be direct must be upon this basis, and even the control of conditions must be upon the assumption that this means warfare upon the living, injury-working parasite. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.