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The article focuses on the effect of unsterile soil leachates on the colonisation by Armillaria mellea (A. mellea) of cylinders of Pinus patula and Cupressus lusitanica with relevance to East Africa. A. mellea is a specialized root inhabiting pathogen which causes severe losses in most plantation crops of the world. The fungus apparently spreads from host to host mainly by root contact and subterranean rhizomorphs. Researchers noted that losses reportedly due to Armillaria root disease were often greater in tea, tung and forest crops in Malawi than in tea and pine plantations in East Africa. A survey of forests in the Kenya Highlands showed that a very high proportion of indigenous trees had root associations with rhizomorphs of A. mellea.