Charles Wilson Bacon

Epichole, also known as Epichloë, is a genus of ascomycete fungi forming an endophytic symbiosis with grasses. Grass choke disease is a symptom in grasses induced by some Epichloë species, which form spore-bearing mats (stromata) on tillers and suppress the development of their host plant's inflorescence. For most of their life cycle however, Epichloë grow in the intercellular space of stems, leaves, inflorescences, and seeds of the grass plant without incurring symptoms of disease. In fact, they provide several benefits to their host, including the production of different herbivore-deterring

Epichloë coenophiala is a systemic and seed-transmissible endophyte of tall fescue, a grass endemic to Eurasia and North Africa, but widely naturalized in North America, Australia and New Zealand. The endophyte has been identified as the cause of the "fescue toxicosis" syndrome sometimes suffered by livestock that graze the infected grass. Possible symptoms include poor weight gain, elevated body temperature, reduced conception rates, agalactia, rough hair coat, fat necrosis, loss of switch and ear tips, and lameness or dry gangrene of the feet. Because of the resemblance to symptoms of

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