ORCHARDING IN FILLMORE COUNTY 57 



rain as it was formerly; liowever, we have no doubt as to tlte benefit 

 of cultivation. Nor have we any doubt as to the benefits of spraying, 

 so we employ that agency for the discomfiture of the worms. As it may 

 be of interest to some, and as I see no regular paper on this subject, in 

 our program, I will give an account of the methods we have used and 

 the cost of spraying. 



A power sprayer of some kind in these days is, of course, a neces- 

 sity, and we use one having a three-horse-power gasolii'e motor, which 

 works very satisfactorily and will maintain a pressure of 200 to 225 

 pounds on three working nozzles. It is equipped with an elevated plat- 

 form 10 feet from the ground, without which it would be impossile to 

 do satisfactory work in the tops of the trees as they are on an average 

 about twenty-five feet high and many are considerably higher. 



In the course of the second and most important spraying, it seems 

 to me that better work can be done, even in lower trees, if more of the 

 spray is directed from above, as most of the blossoms point upward and 

 the insecticide can be thrown more directly into the calyx from above 

 than when wor,king from below or on one side. 



In our second spraying last season, v;e had two men working from 

 the elevated platform and only one on the ground so as to throw more 

 of the spray from above. It nearly drowned the one poor man below, 

 but I think it was of some benefit though I have no figures for com- 

 parison. 



For; spraying material we used lime-sulphur (commercial) diluted 

 at the rate of seven gallons to 250 gallons of water as a fungicide, and 

 lead-arsenate two pounds to fifty gallons of water as the insecticide 

 There are, of course, several brands of each on the market, all doubt- 

 less good, but we found a brand of lead-arsenate last year costing seven 

 cents per pound and using two pounds to fifty gallons of water to give 

 better results than a brand used formerly, costing 22 cents per pound 

 and using one pound to 50 gallons of water, so there is evidently some 

 choice among brands. As complete a record as we could devise of the 

 cost of labor and materials for each spraying was kept and figured up 

 to give totals in each particular. 



In getting at the cost of materials we merely set down at the end 

 of each day the number of tank loads of mixture, of 250 gallons each, 

 applied that day, and as we knew the amount of "dope," as the boys 

 call it, placed in each tank, we could easily tell how much was used 

 each day. I might say in passing that it is well to use up all there is 

 in the tank before stopping at night and then rinse it out well with 

 clean water. If this is not done, and say, half a tank is left to run 

 out next morning, it is almost sure ro form a deposit on the screen or 

 strainer in the bottom of the tank and give trouble by not letting the 

 liquid through fast enough. This deposit will form anyway, in spite of 

 all you can do, and is difficult to remove. However, we accidentally dis- 

 covered one day that a little sulphuric acid poured on the strainer will 



