INJURIOUS TO CABBAGE AND RELATED CROPS 35 



tool. Then commence at the left end, and place the blade as 

 indicated by the dotted lines, and strike at the end of the 

 handle with a light mallet, and a complete card is made. Con- 

 tinue in this manner across the paper. The first cut of every 

 alternate course will make an imperfect card, and the last cut 

 in any course may be imperfect, but the other cuts will make 

 perfect cards if the tool is correctly made, and properly used. 



"The cards should be placed about the plants at the time 

 of transplanting. To place the card bend it slightly to open the 

 slit, then slip it on to the center, the stem entering the slit, 

 after which spread the card out flat, and press the points 

 formed by the star-shaped cut snugly around the stem." 



For late cabbage seed-beds. — The depredations of the maggot 

 in late cabbage seed-beds are often severe and necessitate the 

 growers making much larger plantings of seed than would 

 otherwise be required. Screening the beds with cheesecloth 

 has been found an efficient and practicable method of protection 

 and is now regularly practiced by cabbage growers in certain 

 localities in New York. When this method is used, the seed 

 should be drilled rather thickly in rows 6 to 8 inches apart. 

 The corners of the bed should be staked out so that the cover 

 can be applied before the plants come up. Boards, 6 to 10 

 inches wide, are placed on edge around the bed making a tight 

 enclosure and a cheesecloth cover is stretched over the top. 

 The cloth is supported on galvanized wires stretched across the 

 bed every 4 or 5 feet. The wires are sometimes supported at the 

 middle by short stakes. The cloth is fastened to the boards by 

 strips of lath. Care should be taken to have the boards fit 

 tightly at the corners and at the ends, and the earth should be 

 banked up around the bottom so that the flies cannot work their 

 way under. Even the cheaper, loosely woven grades of cheese- 

 cloth will exclude the flies, but as cloth having less than twenty 

 threads to the inch is likely to stretch and pull apart so as to 

 let in the flea-beetles, it is better to use cloth havino- twentv 



