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164 MINNESOTA STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 
Mr. Crane: Can you give a description of the leaf-hopper? 
Mr. Mackintosh: Itisa little brown insect on the under side 
of the leaf, and when disturbed it will hop or fly away. 
Mr. Brackett: Itis more gray than brown; its relative size 
is considerable smaller than the mosquito. 
Mr. Dartt: Iwas about to say I had had considerable experi- 
ence in spraying; [do not know whether my experience will be 
of any benefit to you or not, butitmight be better than nothing. 
I have worked on that matter for two or three years. I havea 
force pump attached toa kerosene barrel, and I have a horse 
and what I call my apple cart; it is a wagon built on purpose 
to haul apple crates around, and it is so arranged that I can 
guide the horse between the rows. I go along and drive, and 
somebody else does the pumping, and that is the way we do our 
spraying. I have sprayed just after the blossoms fell, and in 
my old orchard I got a very full setting of apples, so heavy 
that they were small, they were diminished in size. Where I 
sprayed later I did not have so many apples, and it was a ques- 
tion with me whether spraying was a benefit, whether if I had 
let the insects destroy,at least,a part of them, it would not have 
been better. But I sprayed again the next year, and last sum- 
mer I sprayed lightly, and there were few blossoms. This last 
season I sprayed all of my trees; I used Paris green. At first 
I used blue vitriol and mixed it with alkali, but the alkali 
cooked the blue vitriol and did not mix, so I stopped and took 
Paris green; it mixed readily. Ido not know whether the con- 
centrated lye killed the force of the Paris green or not, but I 
sprayed in that way,and I really do not know whether the spray- 
ing did a great amount of good or not; but I know this, the trees 
i sprayed have a remarkable healthy look, and they carried it 
all summer long. Of course, there was this twig blight; the 
trees blighted so that it diminished the crop of fruit wonder- 
fully, but still I had quite a little crop of apples; perhaps, one- 
fourth of a crop, may be less than that. I sold 575 bushels of 
the Duchess. I am going to spray next year; I have so much 
faith in it, I shall spray all my trees. I think the spray pump 
should be kept at work, and Iam going to spray. 
We were speaking about mulching trees. I have had a man 
running a team since late in the fall hauling manure into the or- 
chard and spreading it around the trees. In one orchard I 
have had it spread all over the ground. In another orchard I 
have had it put around the trees, and when we come to culti- 
vate the trees we shall mix it in the soil, and I shall give it the 
