146 BUTTERFLIES AND MOTHS. 



When attack is bad, the chief thing to trust to is 

 fertihsing dressings ; but sometimes dressings of gas- 

 lime on the land, and on the plants, will check attack 

 to a serviceable extent. This has been found useful 

 in the attack of caterpillar to hearted Cabbage in the 

 autumn. The gas-lime falls down among the leaves, 

 and thus fills the parts where the caterpillars shelter 

 by day, with what, to a certain extent, keeps them out, 

 and is not pleasing to them. 



With regard to hand-picking caterpillars from the 

 roots, it is often said this cannot pay ; but it is a 

 regular process in some places where field Cabbage is 

 grown ; and on once asking a grower as to it answer- 

 ing, he simply remarked, " If we do not do it we lose 

 our Cabbage." The grubs may be quickly cleared by 

 women turning the soil back at the root of each plant, 

 putting the grub or grubs in a flower-pot, and turning 

 the soil on again. In these kinds of attacks it is quite 

 worth while to reckon on paper the comparative cost 

 of the total or partial loss of crop to be expected, and 

 that of the remedy, and proceed accordingly. Grubs, 

 of the kind we are speaking of now, commonly go on 

 from one plant to another, and cause severe loss, — 

 each morning shows the new fallen plants ; and the 

 grub will so continue eating till it turns to the chry- 

 salis. But it is easily seen ; and once caught we have 

 made a sure cure. This sureness of the cure is the 

 thing to be thought of before trying it. It is often 

 advised to sprinkle lime ; but lime slakes very quickly, 

 and, excepting as a manure, does not do nearly the good 

 that is supposed. Dry dressings often entirely fail in 

 effect, because they often do not adhere to the cater- 

 pillar ; and if they do, very likely they do not hurt it. 

 It has, however, been observed that sudden moisture, 

 especially after hot weather, will destroy Moth or 

 Butterfly caterpillars. They have been recorded by 

 our great authority, John Curtis, as being found, in 

 such circumstances, emptied of their contents, and like 

 mere skins; and in the great attack of Beet Moth 



