46 ORNAMENTAL GARDENING 



so harmful as the lubber. If plants are sprayed with kerosene 

 emulsion from time to time it will prove a tolerable protection 

 against these insects and bran mash and arsenic will help to 

 keep them down. 



Some of the injurious insects seem to come in waves to such 

 an extent that they threaten utterly to wipe out the vegetation 

 on which they prey. Then the tide appears to ebb and their 

 numbers are greatly diminished and the cultivator has a respite. 

 At one time I became so alarmed over the swarm of cottony 

 scales that I cut off and burned all the small branches and leaves 

 of a number of my trees. In a short time the scale entirely 

 disappeared from nearby trees that I had not touched. I have 

 seen a hedge of Acalypha so covered with this pest that it looked 

 as though it had been snowed on, yet in a short time, without 

 any remedy being applied, all the scales had disappeared. 



Insects, however, constitute but a part of the animated enemies 

 of the plant grower. The great blue West Indian land crab has 

 become thoroughly established on our coasts from somewhere in 

 the neighborhood of Palm Beach to Cape Sable, and probably to 

 some distance north of there on the west coast of the state. 

 Fortunately it does not extend far into the interior at any place, 

 but it makes up for that by its pernicious activity along shore. 

 It swarms in the brackish marshes and is only a little less abun- 

 dant in fresh water swamps near the sea, digging out its holes 

 into which it hastens when disturbed. During the dry season it 

 is less in evidence, but when the rains come it commences activi- 

 ties. It then goes out in great numbers into cultivated lands, 

 tearing down and destroying quantities of plants. I have seen 

 banana stems as large as a man's thigh so pulled to pieces by 

 them that they toppled over, and they can and do invariably 

 distinguish between a twenty-five-cent plant and one that cost 

 five dollars, always taking the latter. They are to some extent 

 nocturnal, but in the rainy season are much in evidence in the 

 daytime, especially in wet weather, and they often move out 

 into the highlands. They then live temporarily in holes, some- 

 times in the pine woods; they climb up trees and enter chicken- 

 and out-houses, they invade dwellings and it has been reported 

 that they sometimes play on the piano. Usually they swarm 



