Winter Meeting. 231 



but it is pretty generally distributed over our State. I will not 

 name the exact localities, although it is well known that St. Louis 

 county is over-run with it, but other sections have it as well. 



Eight or ten years ago the best thing we knew with which to 

 fight this insect was whale oil soap, two pounds to a gallon of wa- 

 ter. This destroyed it; we had to use it in the winter when the 

 trees were entirely dormant. It had its disadvantages. It was ex- 

 pensive, and it killed the fruit buds for that year. Then we tried 

 crude petroleum, but cannot advise the use of that. Many kinds 

 of washes came up, and various kinds of patent scalicides. We 

 are still testing them to find out the good ones, and the results 

 show that out of some forty different kinds of patent San Jose 

 Scale washes about two are fairly good. The rest are practically 

 of no value whatever. Even the best is not quite as good as the 

 lime-sulphur v/ash, and the cheapest costs two and one-half times 

 as much. 



I find it hard to make the growers take up this work of ex- 

 terminating the scale in their orchards. I go and see the 

 orchards, advise them what to do and offer all the help in my 

 power, but some slick patent insecticide agent comes along and sells 

 them some worthless insecticide at a high price. The orchardist 

 tries this, and failing, becomes disgusted and stops. Then we 

 sometimes find the man who knows so much that he follows his own 

 methods, and many have absolutely ruined their orchards. 



We have one remedy for San Jose scale which is as good as we 

 can hope for, and it is comparatively cheap. This is the lime-sul- 

 phur wash. California uses a lime, sulphur and salt wash, but we 

 have found that the salt is of no practical value to us. In fact, we 

 get two and one-half to three per cent, better results without the 

 salt. This lime-sulphur wash is not a wash made by just plain 

 mixing of the ingredients. Sulphur alone will not act as an in- 

 secticide. Lime is fairly good. But for this wash I recommend 

 you make it as follows : Slack 15 pounds of lime in the usual way. 

 Use fresh stone ; the better the lime the better results you will have. 

 Put in a receptacle which will stand the fire, and add enough water 

 to make a thick wash. Add fifteen pounds of powdered flour of sul- 

 phur. Bring to a boil and boil vigorously for at least one hour, 

 stirring every little while. This boiling is a tedious process. You 

 can use an iron kettle if you wish to. After boiling an hour, add 

 enough water to make fifty gallons, and apply to the tree while hot. 

 This boiling results in a chemical combination which is neither 

 lime nor sulphur. Apply just before the buds swell in the spring. 



