CHAPTER XV 



Insects, Diseases and Other Pests 



Happily the Carnation is not subject to quite so 

 many insect pests as the Rose is, but it has its full share. 

 The three most troublesome, undoubtedly, are aphis or 

 plant louse, red spider and thrips. To a lesser extent the 

 plants are attacked occasionally by the Rose beetle and 

 Rose chafer, while the Carnation mite (Perviculopsis 

 gramirium) does harm to the flower buds by puncturing 

 them, and also by carrying fungus spores. Damaged buds 

 must be at once picked ofl" and burned. Stigmanose, those 

 yellow spots on the leaves, is really caused by the biting of 

 thrips and greenfly (aphis), this latter being undoubtedly 

 the most persistent and worst insect pest of any. 



APHIS, RED SPIDER, THRIPS 



Long before the grower can see these lice they may be 

 at work well into the center of the growing point of the 

 shoots, and it is only when the leaves begin to develop 

 that the pitted appearance and the dried-up, sickened look 

 of the points of the leaves shows the result of the previous 

 draining of the juices by the hidden foe. 



Examples of the kind of contorted growth we get when 

 the plants are badly attacked by aphis are shown in the 

 illustrations on pages io8 and 231. The flower buds in the 

 latter example were a mere mass of dried looking scales 

 that never would come to anything. To deal with aphis, 



