332 THE ENTOMOLOGIST. 



apple which T can find bearing any mark of the grub's handi- 

 work, and it is very easily detected, I carefully pick off, 

 and have them burnt or destroyed in some way. By pursuing 

 this method at the present time, I shall considerably reduce 

 the Tortrix as far as my garden is concerned ; but if I do not 

 quite succeed in that, at any rate I shall certainly save a 

 respectable share of my fruit, enough for a fair crop. Had I 

 gone to work earlier I should have saved a big one on some 

 trees. I find that the topmost fruit is attacked first. To 

 give some idea of the terrible ravages of this dreadful little 

 pest, I will cite two instances. I took a great number of 

 pierced apples off my espaliers, still, however, leaving a very 

 good crop indeed behind ; and as I find that very few of 

 those apples left are now touched, as I search day after day, 

 I hope that I am pretty safe for a crop, which I am sure 1 

 should not have been had I attended to the trees later. 

 Having finished them, I turned to some of my smaller 

 standards, such as I could conveniently, by the use of steps, 

 search all over, unfortunately losing some days between. 

 The first tree I looked over was a young Wellington, some 

 five or six years old, just coming into nice bearing. I picked 

 196 apples, or more tlian four-fifths of the crop, off that tree, 

 which had been pierced by the grub. There may be two or 

 three dozen or so left; if there are, it is the outside. I then 

 went to a Nonpareil, a great natural bearer, an older and 

 larger tree. Off this I picked 515 apples one afternoon, and 

 94 the next morning : this was perhaps five-sixths or more 

 of the crop. In both instances the crop left was very small 

 indeed for the tree ; while but for the moth it would have 

 been very large. Had I looked at these trees as early as I 

 did at the espaliers, I am convinced that I should have saved 

 at least half the crop or more. It would be a curious expe- 

 riment, easy to try, to take some of the grubs out of apples 

 (as may easily be done), and to place theui on new ones, so 

 as to gauge their rate of destruction from clay to day. It 

 seems strange, considering what a dreadful pest this is, that 

 we are not better up in its habits and powers. 1 feel sure 

 that, by attending to the apples early in June, a good crop 

 may be saved, if gardeners will give themselves the trouble, 

 while they will certainly do much to save their trees from 

 alike visitation next season. — Francis Francis, in the 'Field.^ 



