THE POTATO BLIGHT.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume XLVII, Issue 8179, 11 August 1906, Page 2

THE POTATO BLIGHT.

A FARMER'S DOUBTFUL DISCOVERY.

The 'potato blight came under discussion at the farmers' meeting in Okato on Thursday night. Mr G. V. Tate, one of the officials of the Agricultural Society, mounted the platform, carrying a small parcel. It might have been a dynamite bomb, so carefully did he handle it. Opening his remarks and the package at the same time, Mr Tate said that for a long time past the Government experts had given forth to the world their opinion that the potato blight was carried through the atmosphere from place to place, crop to crop; he was going to disprove that theory, for he had ,with him convincing proof that the blight was in the tuber, and travelled up the stalks to the leaves. Then the] speaker unpacked his proof. It consisted of several tender shoots of growing potatoes, covered with a number of small green insects. These, said Mr Tate, could not have come from the air, for his roatoes had been storod in a dark shed. Dampness had caused them to start growing. The close confinement and dampness, he thought, had given him a splendid culture of the potato blight, which travelled from tuber to tuber, not leaf to leaf. The stalks were then passed round the hall, considerable interest being taken. Honors were about even. Several seemed of the opinion that Mr Tate had got "the real Mackay" ; among others, Mr James Burgess, of Warea, doubled the correctness of the theory, quoting his experience. Blight-free pitatoes, sown a quarter of a mile from any other potato patch, had not been immuno when they approached fruition.

Mr Tate reiterated his theory, and Mr Burgess asked if he would guarantee freedom from blight if the tubers were planted freo from bliglit in land not hitherto cropped, and at a distance from other potato land. Mr Tate said there could be no guarantee that the seed was freo from bli-jht.

Mr Newton King said he was perfoetlyjsure that, while these grean insects might be a blight, they were certainly not the blight that carried off the potatoes last year. From his own experience, and from a talk with the Government Biologist, he was satisfied the bliglit was a fungoid disease, attacking the leaves, and travelling in the air. This was proved by the fact that crops slightly affected had been saved by systematic spraying. He quotcil his own case. His crop had been saved by spraying both over and under the lcayes, whilst neighbouring potatoes were ruined when sprayed only on lop ot the leaves. Mr Tate announced his intention of forwarding samples and particulars to the Government Biologist for his report.