INJURIOUS INSECTS OF 1904. 177 



ENTOiMOLOGICAL SUGGESTIONS FOR THE FLOWEE 



GARDEN. 



Without attempting to list remedies against the army of insects 

 which attack the flower garden, simple remedies against some of 

 the more common forms, which the Entomologist has found useful 

 in his own experience, may be helpful. 



Plant Lice: These are perhaps the most vexatious of* all to 

 those seeking to raise flowers. We find various kinds in the flower 

 garden, on golden glow, sweet peas, roses, spirea, buckthorn, etc., all 

 busily engaged in sucking sap from their various host plants, 

 frequently blasting our hopes of flowers, or good growth of plant 

 or bush unless we take prompt measures against them. We cannot 

 well use the usual radical remedies which are sure death to 

 lice, since they would either destroy the tender growth of the 

 plants, or hide by their offensive odors the delicate fragrance of 

 the flowers. 



Occasionally on sweet peas or other delicate plants, a forcible 

 spraying of water from the garden hose, frequently repeated, will 

 wash them ofif. Fresh pyrethrum dusted on them with a bellows 

 will, of course, kill them, and is an excellent thing if one can buy 

 the fresh material. On shrubbery from which no flowers are to be 

 gathered, whale oil soap, tobacco solution, or weak kerosene emul- 

 sion can well be used. More convenient, easily prepared, anr 

 adapted to all flowering plants is the following soap solution : A 

 5c. cake of Ivory soap dissolved in eight gallons of water Possibly 

 other soap could be used as well as Ivory Soap, but the latter is 

 found in almost every household, and has been successfully used 



Cut Worms: Frequently cutting dahlias and other tender 

 plants. See page 171 for remedies. 



Stalk Borer: This disgusting "worm," found in the growing- 

 shoots of dahlia, hollyhock, golden glow, aster, catalpa, etc., is fre- 

 quently as troublesome in the flower garden as in the vegetable 

 garden, in which latter place it attacks tomatoes, potatoes and 

 other plants, and some shrubs whose stems have a soft center. It 

 is the larva of a brownish moth, and there appears to be more than 

 one brood during the summer in Minnesota ; at least, we have 

 obtained pupae from hollyhocks in xA.ugust, and had the moths 



