The whole 200 [square] yards

[Joel S. Berson]

" "The farmer who called me had found a circle of corn about 50 feet
in diameter or so that had strange symptoms, stalks broken over and
twisting, discoloration, the whole nine yards,' said Clayton Hollier,
a plant pathologist at Louisiana State University. "

The plant pathologist is talking about Goss's wilt, a plant disease
spreading through the corn belt from Minnesota to Louisiana.  It is
caused by a bacterium with the short name Clavibacter michiganensis
subsp. nebraskensis.  Where was the Mississippi River wetback wall
when it was needed?  (Despite what I infer from the "subsp.", the
disease seems to have moved from Nebraska to Michigan.)

NYTimes, Science section, today.

Joel

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