80 STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



under sides and proceed to suck the sap and vitality from the green 

 tissues of the leaf. As the summer advances, the leaves shrivel up, 

 turn yellow and roll up. The aphids remain inside the rolled leaf and 

 it impossible to kill them under such .conditions. These withered 

 leaves weaken the young shoots and leave them susceptible to disease 

 and winter killing. The lice work also upon the fruit. Everyone has 

 seen them upon the cherry. Each plant louse secretes a honey dew 

 which smears up the fruit and attracks whole armies of ants. The 

 fruit is generally left deformed and worthless. 



Many generations of lice are produced in one season, the number 

 varying from ten to twenty. Under ideal conditions a single female at 

 the beginning of the season might be responsible for more than a million 

 of progeny through the season. It is a very interesting fact that until 

 fall no males are produced. The fenmle lice have the faculty of giving 

 birth to living young without the intervention of the male. When the 

 leaf becomes crowded, a winged generation is formed and this tiies 

 away to new leaves. In the fall a male generation is produced and the 

 females deposit their eggs on the bark of the tree for the next year. 



The control of this pest is very simple when properly done. Plant 

 lice must be killed with a contact spray. The two best are the tobacco 

 and kerosene emulsion. The nicotine sulfate solution has proven itself 

 to be the safest remed3^ Use one pint of the forty per cent solution 

 to one hundred gallons of water. As I said before, spray just before 

 the buds open. A stitch in time saves nine. If you can get the ma- 

 jority of lice at this tender period, then there will be little to fear for 

 that season. This tobacco spray costs about |1.15 per 100 gallons and 

 can be combined with the regular lime-sulphur spray for scale which 

 should be applied at just the same time. If this first spray is not given, 

 then it will be possible to obtain fair to good results by using this same 

 spray whenever the pests become too abnoxious. 



UNFAMILIAR PHASES OF BROAVN ROT. 



PAUL .T. ROOD^ SOUTH HAVEN. 



Brown rot is a fungus disease caused by Sclerotinia fructigena. Ex- 

 cept for peach yellows, it has been recognized as the most destructive 

 disease of stone fruits. This disease also affects the apple, the pear, 

 and the quince, though not so seriously. The average annual loss in 

 the U. S., due to this disease alone, easily reaches five millions of dol- 

 lars. 



After weather conditions such as have prevailed throughout this 

 section during the past season, the fruit contains a much greater per- 

 centage of water than under normal conditions and it is upon this fruit 

 of high water content, that the disease grows and spreads the most 

 rapidly. 



Every fruit grower is perfectly familiar with brown rot as it appears 



