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Drawbacks to Apple Culture in Alabama. 



The two most serious enemies to profitable apple growing' 

 so far encountered are the various summer rots that attack 

 the green fruit on the tree, and the green louse or aphis. The 

 first of these can doubtless be held in check in some measure 

 by thorough spraying with Bordeaux Mixture, but they are 

 notoriously hard diseases to fully control. A caneful selection of 

 varieties will do much to do away with this trouble, as some 

 kinds are much more resistant than others. 



The green aphis is very abundant here, and is a veritable 

 pest, especially on young trees. Persistent attempts have 

 been made during the past three summers to control this in- 

 sect by spraying with the mechanical mixture of kerosene 

 and water. With the Deming pump, set to throw only ten 

 per cent, of kerosene, great damage is done to the new leaves 

 and young shoots, and though many of the lice are killed 

 enough are always protected by the curled up leaves to quickly 

 restock the trees. It has not been found possible to rid the 

 trees of them by this means. This is in striking contrast to 

 the result with the somewhat similar plum aphis. The plum 

 foliage is not at all injured by applications as strong even as 

 twenty per cent, kerosene; and at this strength a single 

 spraying will entirely clean up the worst infested tree. Other 

 remedies will be tried during the coming season. 



The apple scab, so troublesome in most parts of the North 

 and East, is seldom seen here. The ccdlin moth, which causes 

 worms in the fruit, and the borers in the trunks, aie both 

 troublesome, but perhaps no more so than in most apple 

 growing regions. Twig blight, which is the same as the fire 

 blight in the pear, often does considerable harm by killing 

 the blossoms and fruit spurs. Apple wood is not as suscepti- 

 ble to this disease as pear wood, and it seldom progresses far 

 enough to threaten the life of the tree. It seems probable 

 that blight rarely passes the winter in apple wocd, but that 

 it is brought to the trees afresh every spring from blighting 

 pear trees. 



