226 SMALL ANIMALS AND INSECTS. [Chap. IL 

 , 



body of the caterpillar. This, he hoped, would prove a sufficient check to 

 the ravagco of this particiihu- pest. 



254. Auother CoDversatiou at the Club about Insects. — Wm. S. Carpentek— 

 All classes of insects have tiicir favorite plants, but if these favorite plants 

 fail, the insects -will take to others. Last year I saw ailanthus trees in this 

 city completely covered with a worm known in the country as the canker- 

 worm. The trees were wholly stripped of foliage. We are continually im- 

 porting insects in various ways. I am told that every banana stem contains 

 a worm, and some of the same sort of worms have been discovered preying 

 upon the quince. 



The rose-slug is easily killed by hand in the after part of the day, by an 

 application of quassia decoction, 6])rinkled upon the leaves, as the slugs are 

 then on the upper surface. 



Extra cultivation, by which the plants grow rapidly, is the best remedy 

 for squash bugs. 



Mr. Pardee said tliat the best remedy is to expose the soil dug from 

 a deep hole several days to the sun, and then put it back in the hole, 

 patting it down solid, and then putting in the seed, and covering it lightly, 

 and then spreading fine charcoal over the hill. 



Mr. FcLLEE— I tried this charcoal remedy, last year, most thoroughly, 

 without deriving a particle of benefit. 



Mr. Paedee — I have used charcoal, and was not troubled with bugs. 

 Now it is possible that, without it, the plants M'Ould not have been troubled. 

 So, after all, it is uncertain whether the charcoal was the preventive, or 

 whether there were no bugs to be eradicated. 



Mr. Garvet — I have tried a great many remedies, and have never found 

 anything so good as careful watering, and hand killing the bugs. 



R. G. Pardee — I wish every man would try the solution of aloes — two 

 ounces to the gallon of water. It is such a bitter vegetable that it is 

 ofi"cnsive to all insects. It may be used just as strong as it can be made — 

 from one fourth to a whole pound to the gallon. 



Mr. Carpenter — The canker-worm, in the northern part of Connec- 

 ticut, is now ravaging the orchards to an extent that is destructive 

 to all prospects of fruit. On some large orchards there are no apples — 

 in fact, nearly all the foliage of the trees has been destroyed. Can this be 

 prevented ? 



Washi7ig Insects from Fniit-Trecs. — Mr. Pardee read a letter from Charles 

 Lincoln, of North Bridgewater, Mass., which stated that he succeeded in saving 

 his plum-trees, last spring, from insects, by washing them frequently with 

 clear cold water, using for the purpose a little hand instrument called the 

 " hydropult." 



Dr. Trimble contended that all the rot in plums is caused by the sting of 

 the curculio. 



Mr. Pardee thought that this statement was incorrect ; that plums fre- 

 quently rot where there are no curculio. He said, thirty years ago, at Seneca 



