Insectivorous Birds. — It is well to remember and protect this class of 

 birds, as they specially benefit the farmer and gardener. The following birds 

 (and the list should be published annually) are to be classed among the most 

 helpful kinds in the general warfare against insects : Robins — cut and other 

 earth worms ; swallows, night-hawks and purple martins — moth catchers ; 

 pewees — striped cucumber bugs ; wood thrushers and wrens — cut worms ; cat- 

 birds — tent caterpillars ; meadow larks, woodpeckers and crows — wire worms ; 

 blue-throated buntings — canker worms ; black, red-winged birds, jays, doves, 

 pigeons and chippies — strawberry pests ; quail — chinch bugs, locusts ; whip- 

 poor-wills — moths ; hawks, all night birds, owls, etc., tanagers, and black-winged 

 Summer red-birds— curculios. There may also be mentioned the following 

 insect pest destroyers : Nut crackers, fly catchers, chimney swifts, indigo birds 

 chipping and song sparrows, blackbirds, mocking birds, and orchard orioles. 



Protection from Wind.— Shelter from cold winds is essential to success 

 with most varieties of fruit. I have Gravenstein, King, and other kinds 

 of apple trees, planted in soil that is annually cultivated and enriched, 

 large enough to bear barrels of apples each, that have never yet yielded 

 a peck of apples, simply because they are fully exposed to all the winds that 

 blow, and from their situation cannot be protected ; the same varieties in another 

 part of my garden, where sheltered by high evergreen hedge, bear satisfac- 

 torily. I know a pear tree, trained on a south wall, facing the cold ocean wind, 

 that has the branches carried around and trained on the east side of the house ; 

 on that branch, on the east side, the pears are three times as large as on the 

 same branch and on other branches on the south side. — Ex. 



Have a Good Lawn. — The charm of a lawn consists largely in its dark 

 green color, luxuriant growth and freedom from weeds. Many try to secure 

 this result by covering their lawns with rotten manure. A much pleasanter 

 method is to sow a mixture of, say, equal parts nitrate of soda, superphosphate 

 and muriate of potash on the lawn this fall, and then next spring give another 

 dressing of nitrate of soda. Apply this fall the above mixture at the rate of half 

 a ton per acre, or say a small handful to each square yard. Sow it broadcast, 

 as evenly as possible. In the spring sow 300 lbs. of nitrate of soda per acre, 

 broadcast, or say a small handful to each three or four square yards of lawn. 

 The above treatment will not only greatly improve the lawn, but will also give 

 increased luxuriance to the trees, shrubs, roses and flowers. 



Insect Powder and Hellebore.— Pyrethrum powder or buhach should 

 be as fresh as possible when used, and it should be kept in a tight vessel. It 

 may be used either pure or mixed with five or six parts of flour ; or applied in 

 water in the proportion of a large tablespoonful to a gallon of water and sprayed. 

 Hellebore, so well known as fatal to the common gooseberry and red currant 

 ** worms," and to the larvse of saw-flies on roses and other plants, is very often 

 used as a pure powder, but it may be more economically applied by mixing with 

 several times its own bulk of flour and still prove very eff"ective. These two 

 poisons are well adapted to common use in a small way, as they are much less 

 dangerous to man than the arsenical mixtures, that are also more likely to injure 

 foliage than kerosene emulsion, which is a safe insecticide to handle. — Rept. 

 Mass. Hort'l. Soc. 



