384 STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



BARK TREATMENT OF APPLE TREES. 



Of the advisability of washing the bodies of apple trees there can be no 

 question ; but we should not place too much reliance upon this practice, and 

 thus neglect the more important things of proper manuring and care of the 

 soil. As a rule, when we see trees coated with moss and fungus, with the bark 

 hanging in loose patches or infested with lice, we can look for the cause in 

 improper or no culture, or want of manure ; but when we find trees in this 

 condition we can much sooner restore them to health and vigor by applying a 

 suitable wash. I object to all the potash washes for apple trees, because, while 

 they will kill moss and remove the loose bark, they seem to burn the tender 

 bark beneath and make it of an unnatural, reddish color, and it again soon 

 cracks or scales up and hangs loosely upon the tree. 



Not so when we use a wash made with caustic soda. While this takes off all 

 moss patches, fungus, and rough bark, and while it will kill all kinds of bark-lice 

 and other insects equally with the potash washes, it leaves the smooth bark a 

 fine healthy green color and not inclined to break loose from the tree. If one 

 cannot get caustic, take sal-soda, put it into an iron kettle, placed over a 

 fire, and let it remain, occasionally stirring, until it turns of a reddish color, 

 which it will when sufficiently heated. It will thus become caustic and answer 

 very well in place of the caustic soda of the shops. If washing does not 

 effectively remove all loose bark, I would use an old hoe or a tree scraper to 

 remove all loose bark. I have occasionally seen orchards scraped hard enough 

 to remove the outer bark and show large spots of white bark. This I regard 

 as a very bad practice, and not to be allowed. I repeat : if an orchard is 

 properly manured and occasionally washed, it will have very little loose bark, 

 and will require scarcely any scraping. — J. S. Woodward, in N. Y. Tribune. 



HIGH CULTURE AND DISEASE. 



From the Land and Home we clip the following item : Floriculturists begin 

 to think that the diseases which afflict plants under high culture are due, as 

 among men and domestic animals, to their forced and unnatural lives. The 

 hyacinth is rapidly deteriorating through disease caused by the nipping of the 

 blossom to increase the bulb ; and lilies, which have long been subject to dis- 

 figuring spots, are now taking a disease involving the bulb as well as the 

 flower. Verbenas, also, have lately been affected by a disease that first attacks 

 the leaves, and then kills them ; even the lusty crocus suffered from some 

 unknown trouble last spring ; while hollyhocks have been so liable to their 

 own form of disease, that they have been banished from many gardens. The 

 remedy would seem to be to let the plants grow more naturally, with less 

 forcing. 



FLOWERS AND THEIR CULTURE. 



MUSIC AND FLOWERS. 



Matter-of-fact farmers, with more stomach than brains, are apt to laugh at 

 those who love music and flowers, and to pronounce the careful cultivation of 

 either the veriest nonsense. To them, the only crops worth raising are those 



