26 SECOND REPORT OF THE STATE ENTOMOLOGIST. 



In a gallon of common soft soap, thinned with a pailful of hot soft 

 water, a half-pound of carbolic acid (the pure) is stirred. After it has 

 stood for a day or longer, or until the proper union has taken place, add 

 thirty gallons of cold soft water, making a barrel of the wash. If a less 

 amount of the wash is needed, of course the proportionate quantities of 

 the materials may be used. The crude carbolic acid would doubtless 

 answer as well, but a larger quantity, perhaps double the amount, would 

 be necessary. 



Later, under date of April 15, 18S0 {Country Gentleman^ xlv, p. 246), 

 the following somewhat stronger wash is given by Mr. Bateham, and it 

 may be presumed to be that which continued experiments have shown 

 to be the most effectual: 



For an orchard of five hundred bearing trees, we buy a pint of crude 

 carbolic acid, costing not over twenty-five cents (or half as much as the 

 refined), then take a gallon of good soft soap and thin it with a gallon 

 of hot water, stirring in the acid and letting it stand over the night or 

 longer; then add eight gallons of cold soft water, and stir. We have 

 then ten gallons of the liquid ready for use. Some peach growers use 

 a little more and some a little less of the acid, but if it is much stronger 

 than the above, it would be apt to injure the trees. The wash should 

 be thoroughly applied with a swab or brush around the base of each tree, 

 taking pains to have it enter all crevices. 



The proper time to apply the wash is about the last of June, if the 

 weather is hot, or the first of July. Mr. Bateham, whose long experi- 

 ence in the cultivation of peaches has made him familiar with the pa- 

 rent moth and observant of its habits, has never seen one in his locality 

 (Painesville, Ohio, N. latitude 41°, 40') depositing its eggs before the first 

 of July. He finds this to be the best time to apply the wash, " as it drives 

 off the moth by its odor, and instantly kills any eggs that may have been 

 deposited." For the apple-tree borers he applies this same wash about the 

 first of June. 



Pyrethrum for THE Cabbage Worm. • 



At the New York Experiment Station, a mixture of one part pow- 

 dered pyrethrum with three parts of plaster or air-slacked lime, has been 

 found quite effective in destroying Pieris rapm larvae on cabbages. It 

 is applied with a wooden bellows manufactured for the application of 

 powdered insecticides, by inserting the nozzle among the leaves, so that 

 the powder is driven through the plant. 



Another mixture of pyrethrum, still further diluted than the above, 

 and therefore more economical, is one part of the powder to twenty of 

 flour, applied with a bellows. Experiments made with this preparation, 

 show the P. rapm larvae to have been killed in twelve hours. 



