78 APPLE GROWING IN CALIFORNIA. 



the orchard rows and the liquid spray is pumped through them under 

 a high pressure from a central pumping plant located at a well which 

 furnishes the water supply. This system is said to work satisfactorily. 



It is the firm belief of the writer that the future will see a great 

 many of our better orchards sprayed by the piping system. The gaso- 

 line pow r er outfit, while we must recognize it as being an effective 

 piece of machinery, has its drawbacks and its limitations. An engine 

 mounted on a truck pulled over rough ground and often drenched with 

 caustic sprays can not be kept in the very best working order and often 

 the fluctuation in pressure is responsible for variable results in spray- 

 ing. With the piping system engines and pumps can be protected in 

 the best possible manner, spray materials can be much more conven- 

 iently handled, and a great deal of the present dread of spraying may 

 be removed. The spraying of large apple trees is not any easy matter 

 and requires so much material that one power sprayer is often inade- 

 quate to handle more than twenty-five acres, where sprajdng must of 

 necessity be done quickly to get the desired results. For instance, 

 the calyx spray for codling moth must be done during a period of 

 little more than a week, if complete calyx control be assured. In a 

 twenty-five acre apple orchard, with seventy trees to the acre, there 

 would be seventeen hundred and fifty trees. If they are large, a two 

 hundred gallon tank will not thoroughly spray over fourteen trees ; 

 that is, one hundred and twenty-five tanks of spray would be required 

 for such a twenty-five acre orchard. It is considered to be a good day 's 

 work to put on ten tanks of spray, so twelve and one half days at this 

 rate would be required to spray twenty-five acres. It is with a full 

 realization of being disputed and possibly ridiculed for these figures 

 that they are published, but it is only asked that a careful investigation 

 of the many failures to get results in spraying be carefully made by 

 those who would disbelieve them, and a full assurance of their approxi- 

 mate correctness is undoubted. 



Before closing this chapter on spraying, a few words, treating of 

 the importance of the "man behind the gun" should not be omitted, 

 for the very best equipment may be of little value with careless, irre- 

 sponsible men entrusted with the work of spraying. The most impor- 

 tant men in a spraying crew are those who hold the rods and direct the 

 spray upon the trees. Their sight must be keen, they must be active 

 and alert, and they can not be thinking of other things continually 

 and do a good job of spraying, for this usually means the thorough 

 wetting of every portion of a tree; and how easy it is to slight the 

 work just enough to defeat the object of the spray. Men who hold 

 spray rods should be gifted with enough intelligence, at least, so that 

 they could be made to know that upon the manner in which they do 

 their work will depend the success or failure of the spraying operation. 



Recently while watching some Chinamen spray an orchard for the 

 control of codling moth, it was noticed that they had no conception 

 of thoroughness and apparently no realization of the important part 

 they were playing in the work. Upon trying to explain to them that 

 the work should be more thoroughly done they seemed quite indignant 

 that any one from the outside should attempt to show them anything. 

 If this important job must be entrusted to the poorest amonii 1 unskilled 

 laborers, their instructions should at least be so complete that the work 

 niiirht not suffer. 



