212 STATE nORTICULTUKAL SOCIETY. 



food of ants would appear to be the larv^ and pupae of those creatures which 

 spend the whole of their brief existences in devouring the tender shoots and 

 juvenile leaves of fruit trees. But nothing in the way of creeping or stationary 

 preyers upon vegetation comes amiss to tlie indefatigable and insatiable ant, 

 whose animosity against the minuter insect tribes is so inveterate that "his 

 great revenge hath stomach for them all." 



PHYLLOXERA IX FRANCE. 



Over 400 members attended the congress on the phylloxera, which was held 

 at Bordeaux, under governmental patronage, and the question, one of the 

 intensest importance to large classes in France, was thoroughly discussed. 

 The loss by this uumasterable vine destroyer is estimated at six hundred 

 millions of "francs per annum, and great numbers of families have been ruined 

 by its prevalence. Of the three methods of treatment — destruction of the 

 insect by submerging the ground, or by using sulpho-carbonates, on the one 

 hand, and replantation with American phylloxera-proof roots, to be then 

 grafted with the French sorts found best for each locality — the latter was 

 preferred. Although an enormous undertaking, far exceeding all the great 

 internal improvements in France, and involving the means of livelihood of 

 over two millions of families, it was voted the surest and best, the other 

 methods requiring annual repetition, and being often unsuccessful. There is 

 a fourth way, not tallied of at all, yet one could wish to see it applied to the 

 failing vineyards there, and to our tobacco fields here. It is the substituted 

 culture of grass or grain, or other products promotive of human health, 

 strength, and permanent enjoyment ! — N. Y. Tribune. 



POISONS IN THE ORCHARD. 



Iowa Agricultural College Quarterly contains the following : 

 Two or three weeks since, we spent a few hours in the immense orchards of 

 A. R. Whitney, of Lee county, Illinois. He has recently had his orchards 

 scourged with the canker worm. After trying various remedies, the pests were 

 wholly eradicated by sprinkling the foliage, by means of a force pump, with 

 •water poisoned with London purple. At once on entering the grounds, the 

 unusual health, size, and perfection of each individual leaf attracted our 

 attention. We had recently been over several large orchards in DuPage 

 county, and in the Fox river section, where a perfect leaf was difficult to find. 

 Insect enemies during the past dry seasons have increased to such an extent as 

 to seriously injure the vitality of the trees by injury to the foliage. While Mr. 

 Whitney had aimed mainly to destroy the canker worms, he had evidently 

 about eradicated all the pests injurious to the leaf. This is a subject worthy 

 the attention of our orchardists. Only a day or two prior to this visit to the 

 orchard of Mr. W., at the nurserymen's convention in Chicago, Mr. 

 Woodward, of New York, made the statement that some of his neighbors had 

 destroyed the codling moth by sprinkling the trees with a solution of London 

 purple at the time when the apples were just forming, and while the embryo 

 fruit was yet in an upright position. It is true that this statement Avas 



