YARMOUTH GARDENS. 



especial advantage over their Ontario 

 brothers, in comparative immunity from 

 Codhng moth. In orchards at Berwick 

 it is estimated that not more than ten 

 barrels in one hundred are affected, 

 while in some of our Ontario orchards, 

 this season, forty out of one hundred is 

 not too high an estimate. 



The best Nova Scotia orchards are 

 the cultivated ones, and those which 

 also get an occasional dressing of pot- 

 ash. Mr. Chute, of Berwick, says he 

 seldom crops an orchard after it is over 

 ten years of age, but cultivates and 

 manures his orchard as the only crop. 



Apple packing is commonly done in 

 the orchard as the picking progresses, 

 but some bring all apples to a central 

 packing house. No. i are large perfect 

 apples, No. 2 are small perfect apples, 

 but no attempt at grading to definite 

 sizes has yet been made. 



It would certainly be well if Nova 

 Scotia and Ontario could agree in this 

 matter, so that grade No. i would mean 

 everywhere apples not less than 2^ 

 inches in diameter, excepting possibly 

 the Fameuse, which should be allowed 

 No. I not less than 2^ inches. No. 2 



would then mean apples below these 

 sizes respectively, or otherwise inferior. 



The prices of winter apples are from 

 two and a-half to three dollars a barrel, 

 or about the same as in Ontario, and 

 the buyers have little advantage over us, 

 having about 15 cents a barrel to get 

 them to the seaport of Halifax, while 

 we have from 30 to 45 to Montreal, 

 the ocean freights being about the same. 



Apple barrels are cheaper than ours, 

 the common kind being made of spruce, 

 fir or pine, with half-rounds of young 

 birch trees for hoops, the price being 

 about 18 cents each. The size is 2^ 

 bushels, the old American pony barrel, 

 but this will soon have to be discarded, 

 for in 1 90c the new Dominion regula- 

 lations will compel the use of a standard 

 barrel. 



Plums, grapes and even peaches are 

 grown to some extent in the Annapolis 

 valley, but the black-knot has largely 

 cleared out the former. When properly 

 looked after, such varieties as Bradshaw, 

 Arctic, Lombard and the Japans, Bur- 

 bank and Abundance, have proved very 

 successful. 



The Mealy Bug. — 

 What is know as the 

 Mealy bug is a flat, 

 tender, yellowish insect, 

 of the form shown in 

 the engraving, and is 

 covered with a white, 

 mealy substance, from which the com- 

 mon name is derived. It is especially 

 troublesome to Coleus, strobilanthes 

 Dyerianus, and many soft-wooded plants. 

 It is not difficult to eradicate. Remove 

 and destroy all that may be found, then 

 syringe the plant two or three times a 

 ^gck with soapsuds to which has been 



added a little kerosene, say two table- 

 spoonfuls to a gallon of suds. — Parks' 

 Floral Guide. 



Hens and Apples. — L. Cook, of 

 Mass., says he enclosed a half dozen 

 unproductive canker worm infested ap. 

 pie trees as a chicken yard, and as a 

 result the insects were cleared and the 

 trees produced good crops of fine fruit. 

 R. N. Y. says, " The hen has a golden 

 claw. She is a professor of Agriculture 

 too, and teaches clean culture and lots 

 of it, with high feeding for a fruit 

 orchard." 



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