ANNUAL REPORT OF THE Off. Doc. 



il is immaterial at which season, fall or spring, the spraying is 

 done. 



How late can we use L. S. S.? This spring the weather being 



unfavorable, we did not finish our apple spraying until buds were 

 expanded so far you could see color of petals. This did some damage 

 to buds causing greater part of blossoms to drop, but did no damage 

 to trees. 



We sprayed 20 acres of apple orchard between March 25th and 

 April 15th; also sprayed 150 peach trees with the lime,, sulphur, 

 salt wash, but as buds were swelling we feared to continue with the 

 peach, thinking it might injure our crop, so we sprayed about 10 

 acres with Bordeaux Mixture No. 1. This was to prevent leaf curl. 

 The results were surprising. Those trees sprayed with L. S. S. had 

 no curl, while those sprayed with Bordeaux, many were very badly 

 affected and lost greater part of foliage, especially Matthews' 

 Beauty and Elberta, Belle of Georgia, Highly, Kalamazoo and few 

 others were affected to a less extent. As soon as we saw the trouble 

 we again sprayed the entire orchard with Bordeaux mixture, 2-5-50, 

 and checked further trouble and the majority set a very fair crop 

 of fruit, but will need but little trimming as the June drop thinned 

 them about right, but those so badly affected, although they are now 

 refoliated and making fine growth, have set but little fruit. I feel 

 confident had w r e sprayed the entire orchard with L. S. S. the trouble 

 would have been avoided and all trees would have had a heavy set 

 of fruit. The third spraying will be given the peach about June 

 22d, and again about 10 days later, to be followed by more spraying 

 as circumstances seem to demand. These latter sprayings will be 

 to prevent fly-speck, fungus and wilt on the fruit. 



To the practical horticulturist, details become monotonous, but 

 I find the average farmer who has done little, if any spraying, wants 

 details. You would be surprised to see the number of letters I get 

 from farmers and fruit raisers asking questions that have been given 

 time without number; but it goes to show that the average man 

 gives little attention to the detail part until he is ready to make 

 use of it, then finds himself stranded. So I hope I will be pardoned 

 if I go into a few details. 



I find that Bordeaux mixture, one of the oldest and most used of 

 all the spraying mixtures, is as little understood as any. One-half 

 who use it do not know if it is to kill scale, codling moth, fungi, or 

 is to fertilize the tree. Not one out of every 10 knows how to prop- 

 erly make it;. not one out of 25 know 7 s what it is. The majority think 

 it is a mixture of sulphate of copper, lime and water. We admit 

 that is what you started with, but a chemical change has taken 

 place, and we have sulphate of lime (gypsum) and hydrated copper, 

 two insoluble compounds. So Bordeaux mixture is these two com- 



