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CITRUS FRUITS. 



Considerable attention has been devoted of late years to the 

 development of the orange and lemon industry in the Colony and 

 in the Transvaal, and we consider that this spirit of enterprize is 

 being directed into a proper channel, as there is undoubtedly 

 room for very many more orange and lemon orchards than 

 we at present have. The development of orange orchard planting 

 in the West began in 1892, in which year it was recognised that 

 the days of the Australian bug were numbered, thanks to the 

 energy of the two ladybirds : the Yedalia, which was imported 

 from California in the latter end of 1891 by the Government, and 

 also the Rodolia, which as far as we know is indigenous to this 

 country and possibly a South African species. It has generally 

 been claimed that the credit was almost entirely due to the work 

 of the imported Vedalia ; we however differ in this, our idea being 

 that although the Vedalia was the more useful insect of the two, 

 being a greater glutton, our local friend had already got the bug 

 under, throughout the Colony, before the Vedalia had established 

 himself sufficiently to warrant his being turned out among the 

 bugs from the specially constructed houses which Mr. C. D. Rudd 

 had built for their accommodation. In the Eastern Province we 

 cannot but think that the ravages of this pest were not nearly as 

 severe as in the West. In our Province hardly an orange tree 

 but was so badly affected, and such a beastly sight that it was cut 

 down either just above the ground or at three to six feet above, 

 and very many thousands of orange trees of above fifty years of 

 age, and standing like forest trees, were grubbed out and burned. 

 We consider the reason that the West suffered worse being that 

 the Rodolia made its appearance in the East, perhaps had always 

 been there, and in those parts was in sufficient force to prevent 

 the entire destruction of the tree as happened here. 



We may here state that the Australian bug (Icerya Purchasi) 

 has been one of the most terrible pests that have affected vegeta- 

 ble life, and has been known all over the world. In the latter 80's 

 and early 90's the State of California was ravaged by this pest, and 

 the growers were threatened with total ruin, which would have 

 practically been a collapse of the southern part of the State of 

 California. The State Board of Horticulture however grappled with 

 the question, and sent one of their Entomologists to Australia to 

 discover if possible a parasite ; this was in a short time successfully 

 done, with the same little friend that California gave us a few years 

 later, to wit, the Vedalia Cardinalis. 



