HORTICULTURAL BULLETINS. 



349 



Florida, and other gulf states. The only symptom which the writer has seen 

 above ground was scanty growth. No good remedy is known. Of course trees 

 affected with root-lvnot should never be planted. 

 Borers (fig. 10), are exceedingly troublesome in some regions, especially on sandy 



soils. A great number of washes and vari- 

 ous labor-saving devices have been recom- 

 mended, but the best method for dealing 

 with them is the old one of carefully uncov- 

 ering the trunk of the tree at the earth sur- 

 face and digging them out with a sharp 

 knife. In sandy lands they should be 

 attended to twice a year— spring and fall. It 

 is back-aching work, but can scarcely be 

 trusted to an inexperienced hand, who will 

 often do more injury to the trees than an 

 army of borers. Of labor-saving devices, 

 one of the best, especially for young trees, 

 is the covering of the base of the trunk in 

 early spring with straw or cheap Chinese 

 matting, the lower end of which should be 

 buried an inch or two in the soil. This com- 

 pels the insect to oviposit on the upper part 

 of the trunk and on the bi-anches, where 

 the larvse are easily found and where they 

 do less general and permanent injury. 



The pin borer, a scolytid beetle of Euro- 

 pean origin (figs. 11, 12, 13, 14, 15), has in 

 recent years become rather troublesome in 

 the eastern part of the United States. No 

 good remedy is known, but some trouble can 

 be avoided by annually removing all dead 

 wood from the orchard and taking care that 

 it is not piled anywhere in the vicinity. 

 Tliis sliould be done in the fall or winter. 

 The insects prefer siclvly trees, but while 

 the larvse are generally confined to such 



Fig. 18.— Black peach aphis— jointsof antenna: 

 a, of young lice; h, first long joint of winged 



form; c, second; d, third; e, whip joint; /, top trees, the mature beetle often migrates to 



3^1' Smith T*^® ^'^^ °^ * ^'"^^® ^''"^® ^"'^^' liealthy trees and feeds upon them, to their 



great injury, the gummy trunks appearing 

 as if peppered with fine shot. The most serious depredations the writer has seen 

 on healthy trees were where piles of dead 

 wood from old peach orchards were placed 

 near healthy trees. Two cases in particular 

 —one in Maryland and the other in western 

 New York— Avere very striking, the injuries 

 beginning in trees near large piles of dead 

 wood and becoming less and less in trees 

 more remote from these piles until all trace of 

 injury disappeared. 



Brown or black root aphides (figs. 16, 17, 18) 

 are very common in the sandy lands of New 

 Jersey and Delaware, and also occur in other 

 parts of the eastern states. The insect some- 

 times appears on parts above ground, but the 

 chief injury is done while it is out of sight. 

 As before stated, care should be taken that 

 this insect is not introduced into the orchard 

 on the roots of the trees when they are 



planted, and if there is any reason for thinking that the roots are infested the trees 

 should either be discarded or dipped in some insecticide before planting. The 

 underground depredations of this insect stunt tlie tree so that it dies or makes very 

 little growth for several years. Stunted trees may, however, be started into a more 

 vigorous growth by heavy applications of tobacco dust dug into the earth, and 

 they may sometimes be l)rought out and induced to make a good growth l»y the 

 application of strong stable manure. , 



Fig. 19. -The curculio {Conotrachelus nenu- 

 phar) 1, Natural size (original); 3, much 

 enlarged (after Howard). 



