THE PRACTICAL ENTOMOLOGIST. 



69 



considering the prodigious number of eggs laid by 

 almost every species — that the great Antagonistic 

 Balance between cannibal and parasitic insects and 

 other inset-devouring animals on the one hand, 

 and the plant feeding insects on the other hand, 

 should be so admirably arranged by an All-wise 

 Providence, that but very few disturbances occur 

 in the harmonious adaptation of all the parts of the 

 great System of the Creation. B. D. w. 



^ 



AHOTHEE UNIVERSAL REMEDY. 



I find the following in the Country Gentleman 

 of Jan. 10, 1867, evidently reprinted from some 

 California paper. It has since started on its travels 

 through the Agricultural Press, with most of the 

 references to its Californian origin suppressed. 



One Smith, of Tolano county, fin California.] having 

 had his trees very much injured by worms, said he would 

 very willingly give lifty dollars to know of a remedy that 

 would keep them down. We advised him to try one 

 remedy, viz : To bind a bundle of the boughs or twigs of 

 the red cedar around the body of each tree, with the butts 

 uppermost. We have since heard that the experiment 

 was entirely successful ; thougii armies of worms made a 

 charge upon them, he had a full supply of peaches and 

 other fruit. 



It may not be generally known, that worms and insects 

 of any kind are very rarely seen upon any of the varie- 

 ties of the cedar family. We think that red wood and 

 white cedar thus packeil around the body of trees, would 

 be very advantageous in protecting any kind from tlie 

 miller or worms, to be applied near the ground every 

 spring. 



Kern County, Cal. S. W. JEWETT. 



It is quite manifest, that such a remedy as this 

 can be of no avail whatever against winged insects, 

 that deposit their eggs on the limbs or twigs or 

 leaves of the tree. Against species, such as the 

 notorious Caukerworm, where the female moth is 

 wingless and has to crawl up the trunk of the infested 

 tree, in order to deposit her eggs thereupon, it may 

 be more or less effectual ; on the same principle 

 that bands of cotton-wool round the trunk, or tarred 

 bandages wrapped round the trunk, or sorghum 

 molasses smeared on the trunk itself, form a me- 

 chanical impediment to the ascent of the female 

 insect. It may also prevent the periodical ascent 

 of tree-cutworms from the ground on to the tree ; 

 (see Practical Entomologist, I, pp. 85 — 6,) 

 for it has been already shown that they have such 

 worms in California. (/6tV/.) Lastly, it may pre- 

 vent such worms or caterpillars as, having stripped 

 the tree on which they were' raised of its leaves, 

 are on their travels in search of other trees, from 

 mounting the tree thus protected. But that it can 

 be of the least use against any other insects, I do 

 not believe. It is a mistake to suppose, because a 

 particular in.sect will not eat Red Cedar, that there- 

 fore the presence of a bunch of Red Cedar a few 

 yards off would be offensive to it. If this were so, 

 trees growing near a Red Cedar bush would be free 

 from insects, which is certainly not the case. 



The trouble in this, as in so many other cases, 

 is, that inexperienced persons do not sufficiently at- 

 tend to the very wide difference in the habits of 

 different Insects. Because Red Cedar boughs have 

 prevented Tree-cutworms and one or two other par- 

 ticular insects, under particular circumstances, from 



mounting fruit-trees and destroying their buds or 

 their foliage, therefore it is inferred that it will keep 

 off all other " worms." As well might we infer, 

 beeau.se Sulphur cures the Itch, that therefore it 

 will cure the Gout. As well might we argue that, 

 because a Cow will eat timothy hay, therefore a 

 Hog will do the same. Finally, we might as well 

 in.sist upon it, because the Indians of California 

 habitually eat rats and mice, lizards and snakes, 

 grasshoppers, crickets and caterpillars, and consider 

 as an especial delicacy a white grub as big as a 

 man's thumb found in old rotten wood, that there- 

 fore civilized Americans have the same eccentric 

 habits. B. D. w. 



BORERS.— The Plug-ugly Theory. 



The following is going the rounds of the Agri- 

 cultural Press, and as it contains the very quint- 

 essence of conceit, ignorance and folly, I propose 

 to nail it to the counter as base coin. 



BoitEiis IN Apple Tp.eks. — Much has been written about 

 this pest, and the whole of it does not amount to any 

 thing. When you find that one has made a hole in tho 

 tree, drive in a plug. That is death to them. 



The writer evidently supposes, that the borer 

 perishes for want of air when the plug is driven in. 

 So far is this from being the case, that in breeding 

 borers, as I know by experience, the great object 

 is to exclude the air from them as much as possible. 

 Several years ago, having split several boring lar- 

 vae, nearly an inch long, out of honey-locust tim- 

 ber in the spring of the year, and being desirous 

 to find out what beetle they would change to, I took 

 a solid block of honey-locust wood, bored three nice 

 smooth holes in it, to the depth of an inch or two, 

 with a stock-and-bit of suitable size, slipped a sin- 

 gle larva head foremost into each hole, and then 

 plugged up each hole with a a round oaken plug, 

 driven in with a hammer so as to be as nearly air- 

 tight as possible. According to the "Plug-ugly" 

 theory, all of these three larvse ought to have died 

 forthwith. The plug would have been " death to 

 them." But what were the facts '! They lived 

 and flourished, boring hither and thither in the 

 block, but never boring to the surface till twelve- 

 months afterwards, shortly after which they came 

 out all three of them as perfect beetles — the JSbu- 

 ria 4-ijeniuiata of Say. 



Most boring larvte make their way to the surface 

 of the infested tree shortly before they are ready 

 to assume the perfect form, or so nearly to the sur- 

 face as to be merely separated therefrom by a thin 

 layer of bark. If the hole that they have bored 

 is plugged immediately, they will simply bore a new 

 one, thereby doing additional damage. If the hole 

 is plugged after they have assumed the pupa state, 

 it may perhaps imprison the perfect beetle and pre- 

 vent his making his way out to propagate the breed, 

 but it in DO way lessens the damage done by the 

 individual insect. But if, as is most usually the 

 case, the hole is plugged after the perfect beetle 

 has escaped, it is merely locking the stable doo.r 

 after the steed is stolen. 



So much for the " Plug-ugly Theory." What 

 next, gentlemen ? B. D. w. 



