EXPERIMENT STATION EEPOET. 603 



Carbolic Aoid. 



This material is not new as a scale^killer, but was tried and 

 abandoned for various reasons soon after experiments began in 

 New Jersey, Nevertheless, reference to it cropped up again in tbe 

 ''Rural New Yorker" and the "American Agriculturist," two of 

 the agricultural papers most widely circulated in New Jersey. 

 The note in the "Rural New Yorker" was as follows : 



"An Annandale writer in the High Bridge "Gazette" says: 

 Several of the peach growers in this section are applying crude 

 carbolic acid to their trees to kill the San Jose scale. John Shurts,. 

 of this townshiji, tried this remedy for the scale last year, and says 

 it is a complete success. The acid is applied with a brush to the 

 trunk of the tree to about three feet from the base, when the sap is 

 rumiing up. It is claimed that the acid gets into the sap and is 

 conveyed to all parts of the tree, killing every scale on it. The 

 growers claim that the fruit is not affected by the acid, while the 

 trees are much invigorated. Jeremiah Hall, of Stanton, was the 

 first to discover the value of the acid as a scalecide. The advantage 

 of this treatment over the old is that it will kill the scale after a 

 tree has become affected with it, while nearly all of the old reme- 

 dies were merely preventives." 



The note in the "American Agriculturist" was longer, but cov- 

 ered the same subject : 



"A Hunterdon county man, J. H. Hall, has come out with a 

 new remedy for the San Jose scale. It is crude carbolic acid 

 simply brushed on the trunk of the tree. He and two other fruit 

 growers personally known to the writer have tried it for two sea- 

 sons, and give strong testimony to its beneficial effects. According: 

 to their experience, it means the entire riddance of the tree of this- 

 insect pest, but hciw it does it is not explained. Whether it is the 

 persistent fumes of the stuff constantly arising through the tree- 

 top, or whether it works some slight change in the sap of the tree 

 which makes it unwholesome to the scale, can as yet be only sur- 

 mised. 



"The latter version is usually considered among the impossibili- 

 ties, but reports of some recent experiments on the current number 

 of the 'Scientific American' do prove that chemicals may enter the 

 sap of a tree and have effect on its health. This, taken in connec- 



