peach yellows (pech yel"oz)

A peculiar and very destructive disease affecting the cultivated peach-tree. It is entirely confined at present to the orchards of the eastern United States, where it annually causes the death of many you sands of trees. The leaves become dwarfed, distorted, and "scorched" in appearance, the twigs pale and dwarfed, and the fruit red spotted and prematurely ripe. In the first year the disease usually causes only a more or le premature ripening of the fruit; in the second year it is more marked, the whole tree having a sickly languishing appearance, with the entire foliage dwarfed and rolled or curled up, and yellowish or brownish-red (whence the name) in color. The diseased tree rarely dies in the second year of attack, and lives beyond the fourth or fifth year. Little no valuable fruit is produced after the second year. The cause of the disease is at present unknown, but from the investigations that are now being carried on it seems very probable that it is a bacterium. See yellows. 4342