ABSTRACT
The effects of the Irish famine were not limited to Great Britain. Its impact was felt throughout much of the western world and on the history of modern era. The devastating epiphytotic of the potato disease in the middle of the 19th century was one of the most tragic events in human history. It swept the whole of Europe and USA, but it was catastrophic in Ireland. The science of plant pathology, evolving for a long time, was born. Berkeley, the most prominent British mycologist of his time, had, after initial reservations, accepted the causal role of microorganisms. The Tulasnes (1847 AD) referred most favourably to Prevost's work and accepted his concept that fungi can incite disease in plants. Their crowning work was the superbly illustrated Selecta fungorum carpologia. Plant pathology in Australia began in the 19th century as a result of sporadic rust epiphytotics which blighted wheat crops and devastated part of the vital supply of the pioneers.
