GENERAL PRACTICE. ENEMIES. 



269 



the overwhelming fondness of the Pink-spotted Millipede (J. guttatus) for mangolds 

 may be turned to account in attacks on special crops by placing slices of mangolds for 

 traps, which I have seen swarming (when removed) with the millipedes crawling over 

 them in all directions." Baits of beet answer well in strawberry quarters, also pieces 

 of carrot, parsnip, and cut potatoes. Mangolds would, unquestionably, be useful in 

 orchards, with sheep to trample the millipedes to death. Soot at the rate of 40 

 bushels per acre or 1 peck per rod drives 

 millipedes away, and a mixture of salt and 

 nitrate of soda effects their destruction, 

 applying 3 cwt. of salt and 2 cwt. of 

 nitrate of soda per acre, or 3| pounds of 

 the mixture per rod in spring. This also 

 acts as a manure to the land. 



Red Spider (Tetranychus telarius). This 

 is u mite, not a spider, and one of the fruit 

 grower's greatest pests. Though so small as 

 to be scarcely visible to the naked eye, it 

 may be found in summer-time, occasionally 

 in myriads, upon the under side of the leaves 

 of fruit trees, and its injurious effects are 

 very great. A severe attack of this minute 

 insect causes the leaves to fall prematurely, 

 prevents the fruit attaining its full size, and 

 the growths and buds formed are so weak- 

 ened as to imperil the succeeding crop. " Eed 

 spider," says Speechly, with truth, "generally 

 reside and breed on the under side of the 

 leaves, and the infested leaves are very distinguishable as soon as they are attacked by 

 them, for the insect wounds the fine capillary vessels with its proboscis, and this causes 

 the upper surface of the leaf to appear full of very small dots or spots of a light colour. 

 When the Acari (mites, or red spiders) are very numerous, they work a fine web over 

 the whole of the under side of the leaf, as also around the edges thereof ; and it is curious 

 enough to observe that they commonly carry this web in a straight line from one angle 

 of the leaf to another, on which boundary line, in a warm day, they pass and repass in 



Fig. 79. KED SPIDER (TETRAOTCHUS TELABIUS) ON 

 MELON LEAF. 



Under side of leaf, showing the top and right side 

 attacked ; white patches, indicating tissues destroyed ; 

 small dots, insects on leaf ; edges of leaf drawn inwards 

 by webbing ; dark portion of leaf generally free, but 

 invasion spreading from the stalk upwards ; below the 

 leaf, insects greatly magnified. 



