STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 95 



at last to be a question of finance. Man can hold the cmculio in check 

 if he is able and willing to spend time and labor enough in the operation 

 It is simply a matter of dollars and cents. But the worst of it is that the 

 war seems to be interminable. The Turk never retreats, and he never 

 surrenders. He is like an old general we used to read of in the Mexican 

 war — if he is beaten, he does not know it. The destruction of the cur- 

 culio has for many years formed a part of the regular estimate of expenses 

 in raising the peach. Col. Forbes, of South Pass, estimated that it cost 

 him about seven cents per tree, or seven dollars per hundred, for the sea- 

 son. But Col. Forbes is a man of great energy and systematic industry ; 

 and Mr. Paul R. Wright, and other intelligent horticulturists with whom 

 I have conversed, consider that in the case of most peach raisers, this esti- 

 mate is too low. Perhaps ten dollars per hundred may be taken as a rea- 

 sonable estimate. The two established methods of contending with the 

 curculio are, capturing them under chips, which is most effective early in 

 the season, and subsequently jarring them down upon sheets spread over 

 a movable frame, and universally known as the Curculio-Catcher. These 

 methods are too well known to require description. I will only remark 

 that the old bumping machine is now being superceded by a smaller and 

 lighter canvas, which is borne upon the person of the operator, the 

 branches over it being struck with a mallet. The advantages of this 

 modification are, that it is less expensive; it is held more directly under 

 the jarred limbs, and therefore fewer of the insects fall outside of it, and 

 it can be used upon old and rigid trees, and upon rough ground and 

 hillsides, where the use of the old machine is difficult or impracticable. 

 Experience has shown that we cannot calculate much upon the operation 

 of natural agencies in aiding us in our contest with the curculio. As to 

 climatic influences, there is some reason to suppose that a dry period fol- 

 lowing a wet one may sometimes so harden the ground as to imprison 

 within it the larvae which have entered the earth for the purpose of trans- 

 formation. This view seems to be corroborated by the well-known cir- 

 cumstance that curculios, after having been comparatively scarce, some- 

 times swarm in great profusion immediately after a warm rain. But if 

 this condition of things ever occurs to any considerable extent, it can 

 only be in stiff, clayey lands. 



These insects are known to be destroyed, to a moderate extent, 

 by natural enemies, both predatory and parasitic, but not so as to percep- 

 tibly diminish their numbers. 



Third — The Canker Worm. This insect, though less generally dif- 

 fused the codling worm or the curculio, yet wherever it does get a foot- 

 hold, is one of the most troublesome and inveterate enemies that the 

 orchardist has to contend with. They have been steadily on the increase, 

 for a number of years past, in several of the more northern counties of 

 this State, where they have already ruined a considerable number of 

 orchards, and where they bid fair to destroy many more. When canker 

 worms once get a foothold in an orchard, they usually hold it with a fatal 

 grasp, and do not cease their dejjredations until the death of the trees, 

 and their own consequent starvation clo.ses the scene. 



