The Codling-Moth. 127 



which gets as many apple-worms to cat in its native home as do 

 some of our own native birds in our orchards. As the Rural New 

 Yorker puts it : " This foreigner shouJd furnish a certificate 

 of good moral character before being allowed to land." The 

 English sparrow was introduced into the United States to destroy 

 cankei-worms, and to-day it is an unmitigated pest, while the canker- 

 worms were never more numerous and destructive than now. Dr. L. 

 O. Howard, in a recent address (Proc. Am. As. Ad. Sci. for 1897) has 

 well said : "We have thus had sufficient experience with intentional 

 importations to enable us to conclude that, while they may often be 

 beneficial in a high degree, they form a very dangerous class of experi- 

 ments and should never be undertaken without the fullest understand- 

 ing of the life-history and habits of the species. Even then there may 

 be danger as, with a new environment, habits frequently change in a 

 marked degree." 



And yet, in spite of the above array of enemies, enough codling- 

 moths succeed in running the gauntlet every year to allow it to take 

 rank as the most destructive apple pest in nearly all parts of the world. 



How TO Fight* THE Codling- Moth. 



« 



The codling-moth seems to have ravaged orchards for twenty cen- 

 turies before anyone accorded any suggestions by which it might be 

 checked.* During the past seventy -five years, however, so many 

 schemes have been devised that it would require volumes to contain 

 all that has been said pro and con concerning them. Believing that 

 oftentimes it is just as valuable to a fruit grower to know 7v/iat not to 

 do as it is ivJiat to do, and that one method may be more applicable or 

 practicable under certain conditions than another method, we have 

 thought it advisable to briefly discuss all of the so-called '' remedies " 

 that we have seen suggested. 



* Of interest, historically, is the fact that, so far as we can discover, the 

 first one to even hint at any remedial measnre was an American, a Mr. 

 Thatcher. In the second edition of his ADierican Orciiardist, he shrewdly 

 reasons that as the worms are said to spend the winter on the tiunks of the 

 trees, it would be well to scrape off all lose bark and apply Fors} tli's wash 

 (consisting of soap-suds, lime and cow-dung) ; this would certainly help in 

 reducing the number of the pest. 



