REPORT OF TEE ENTOMOLOGIST AND BOTANIST 201 



SESSIONAL PAPER No. 16 



about an hour and then adding the blue vitriol, which has been dissolved in hot water, 

 and boiling for 15 or 20 minutes longer.' 



Mr. W. H. Owen, who has done a great deal of work against the San Jose Scale, 

 on Catawba Island, Ohio, and has tried all of the different remedies which have been 

 suggested from time to time, wrote me recently : ' In 1903 the original California for- 

 mula was somewhat modified. "The quantities cf the new formula being lime 15 lbs., 

 sulphur 15 lbs. and salt 15 lbs. to the 50 gallons of w^ater, and this gave equally good 

 results with the old formula. The Oregon wash of 15 lbs. of lime, 15 lbs. of sulphur 

 and li lbs. of blue vitriol, is what I used during the past season, and I cannot expect 

 to find anything that will do bettor work than this, both on the San Jose Scale and 

 the Leaf Curl. When properly made it surely is a perfect insecticide and fungicide. 

 Too much stress cannot be laid upon proper making; for I believe that failure in ob- 

 taining satisfactory results can in most cases be traced to careless making.' 



The lime-sulphur-and-salt wash, as made in the old method by boiling for a long 

 time, is very fatal to scales, and many other kinds of insects, and there has been a 

 constant effort made to see if the long boiling cannot be avoided. The point aimed 

 at is to dissolve the sulphur thoroughly by means of the lime and heat, and to form a 

 double sulphide of lime. There is an excess of lime in all the formulas used, but this 

 ii in no way detrimental. The mixture, however, is not a pleasant one to use, being 

 caustic if it gets on the bare flesh, and is very destructive to clothes of workmen using 

 it. For this reason old clothes should be worn and the hands should be protected with 

 gloves. It must only be used as a winter wash, for if of sufficient strength to destroy the 

 scale, it would injure foliage as well as sensitive stock in autunui before the buds 

 are dormant ; but, when buds are quite dormant, it may be used upon all fruit trees and 

 other hard-wooded plants liable to infestation by the San Jose Scale. Its effective- 

 ness has been proved by several, and one instance which has been seen by many of our 

 Ontario fruit growers, is the case of some plum and peach trees in the orchard of 

 Mr. W. W. Hilborn, at Leamington, Ont. In the spring of 1903, Mr. Hilborn found 

 that a small block of trees was badly infested with the scale. He at once procured a 

 plant for making the lime and sulphur wash and sprayed the trees thoroughly. These 

 trees were examined by me with great care on November 25 last, and I could not find 

 a single living scale. All experimenters recommend that this wash should be applied 

 while it is hot; but, as a matter of fact, this is seldom done in practice, although those 

 who have used hot or warm wash will notice how much more convenient it is to spray 

 when in this condition, and it certainly is more effective in killing the scale. 



A simple formula for making this wash in small quantities is 1 lb. lime, i lb. sul- 

 phur, and 3 gallons of water. 



THE NEW LIME-SULPHUR-SODA WASH. 



The chief difficulty in making the wash has been the expense and inconvenience 

 of boiling it for such a long time, to thoroughly dissolve the sulphur, and several of 

 our fruit growers have inqitired for information concerning some experiments which 

 have been mentioned in the agricultural press and which were undertaken to dissolve 

 the sulphur with caustic alkali and lime, instead of the troublesome and lengthy 

 boiling. These experiments originated with Professors Victor Lowe and P. H. Par- 

 rott at the New York Agricultural Experiment Station, Geneva, N.Y., as set forth 

 in the Station Bulletin No. 22S, 1902, and consisted of dissolving the sulphur by 

 means of caustiq soda or caustic potash in addition to the lime. In making the wash, 

 40 lbs. lime were slaked in hot water, using only enough water to make it boil rapidly, 

 and while slaking 20 lbs. of ground sulphur, which has been made into a thin paste, is 

 added and thoroughly mixed with the slaking lime. Pive pounds of caustic soda in 

 solution is then poured in with more water as needed, and the whole is stirred thor- 

 oughly. As soon as chemical action has ceased, hot water is added to make the wash 



