THE IHAWAIIAN 



rOR£5TER I AGRICULTURIST 



Vol. XI. MARCH, 1914. No. 3 



"Root Borers and Other Grubs in West Indian Soils," by H. A. 

 Ballon, entomologist of the Imperial department of agriculture 

 for the West Indies, has been issued in the pamphlet series of that 

 department. It is concise in its descriptions and illustrated with 

 more than a score of fitrures. 



A.n exchange tells of ironbark foliage destroyed by insects, the 

 Lerp (Psyllidoe), aphis-like insects which attack eucalyptus trees, 

 suck up the sap and construct delicate shell-like coverings called 

 "lerps," under which they grow, moult several times and then 

 appear as minute four-winged insects, which lay the eggs noticed 

 on the leaves, from which fresh broods soon hatch. Generally 

 only temporary damage of the trees, during thie season of preva- 

 lence, is caused by the insects. Minute chalcid wasps are para- 

 sites of the Lerp insects, checking their unlimited increase. 



IXTEXSIJ^E FARMIXG. 



Half a page of the Washington Herald was lately taken by an 

 article to magnify intensive farming, the author being Truman 

 G. Palmer, student and writer on agricultural subjects. It is in 

 reply to an interview with Thomas Xixon Carver, of the federal. 

 Department of Agriculture, which held that "intensive farming 

 is expensive farming." Referring to a statement by ]\Ir. Carver 

 that the 16,000 acres which had been said was formerly required 

 to support an Indian and his family would now provide farms of 

 160 acres each for 100 white families. Mr. Palmer says that the 

 "unrepealable law of nature" that drove the Indian out "is equally 

 applicable when comparing the one family which 160 acres will 

 support by 'extensive' agriculture and the four families it will sup- 

 port by applying "intensive" agriculture." He argues at length 

 that intensive farming will cheapen the cost of living to the con- 

 sumer while yielding the farmer a greater revenue per acre. Fur- 

 ther, Mr. Palmer gives definite instructions in a plan of rotation 

 of crops, to show what he means by intensive farming. Instead 

 of sowing four fields of 25 acres each to cereals annually, the in- 

 tensive farmer sows three to grain, planting some root crop in the 



