235 



ture and a g'cncral lessenins^;- of the extremely harsh temperature 

 and excessive siinHg-ht in the regions alluded to, which would 

 gradually render them suitable for settlement. With the pro- 

 duction of humus from tree growth and proper irrigation, a soil 

 could be developed which would compare well with any other on 

 the islands. 



Any readers possessing copies of Mr. F. E. Conter's paper on 

 "Sisal,'' which constitutes No. 4 of the Bulletins of the Hawaii 

 Experiment Station, will confer a favor by forwarding them to 

 the Forester. At present the issue is out of print and requests 

 for copies have lately been received. 



LADYBIRD v. WOOLLY APHIS. 



On the 27th inst. I made another inspection of Mr. Muir's, For- 

 est Hill, Mount Barker, to see the result which has attended the 

 introduction of the ladybirds {Leis Conforinis) introduced from 

 Tasmania and liberated last year on the apple trees infested with 

 woolly aphis. This orchard is one of the old-established ones, 

 of the district, and as a number of the apple trees were not on 

 blight-proof stocks the pest made great headway when once intro- 

 duced, and has been to the owner a source of worry and expense 

 to keep it any way within bounds. At present, sO' satisfactorily 

 has been the work of the ladybirds, there are only a very few ap- 

 ple trees with any trace of the woolly aphis, and these seem ,to 

 have been missed by the ladybirds, although numbers were placed 

 on them while these friendly insects were plentiful. Mr. Aluir 

 informs me that he intends to thoroughly spray immediately v^U 

 infested trees, and destroy all trees not of blight-proof stocks, 

 and hopes by this means to eradicate the pest, which has been re- 

 duced to such a small matter by the predaceous insects. 



Numbers of another kind of ladybird, the Oreus Australasiac, 

 indigenous tO' this country, are present in the orchard, and are 

 doing good work on the Greedy Scale, the soft Brown Scale, and 

 the Black Scale, but no trace, so far, of the internal parasites 

 lately liberated for the two latter could be discovered. — Inspector 

 David L. Breen in the Journal of Agriculture, W. A. 



