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is once wounded by them, it grows 

 no bit^ger, unless it be in ill shapes, 

 and hard excrescences, and becomes 

 totally unfit for the tabie. As to 

 potatoes, I have seidon) known 

 them do much hurt, unless when 

 they were planted in a soil that did 

 not suit them particularly in a clay. 

 It is easier to say what will not stop 

 those borers, than what will do it. 

 I have manured with sea mud ; ap- 

 plied dried salt to the soil after the 

 plants were up ; mingled dry salt 

 with the seed when it was sowed ; 

 steeped the seeds in brine before 

 sowing, and coated them with sul- 

 phur ; but all in vain. 



I suppose the burning of a stub- 

 ble as it stands would destroy all the 

 worms that happened to be very 

 near to the surface. A certain En- 

 glish writer thinks that a perfect 

 summer fallow would destroy them, 

 partly by exposing some of them 

 to the heat of the sun at each 

 ploughing, and partly by depriving 

 them of food. 



I should think ploughing late in 

 autumn might destroy many of 

 them, by exposing them to the most 

 violent action of the frost. Or in 

 a garden throwing up the soil in 

 ridges with the spade, so to lie du- 

 ring the winter, would have a good 

 effect. Liming plentifully, if it 

 could be afforded, I should rely up- 

 on as a most effectual antidote to 

 this, and several other kinds of in- 

 sects. The Complete Farmer men- 

 tions lime and soot as good anti- 

 dotes to this insect in particular. 



Red Worm, or Wire Worm. Mr. 

 William Moody of Saco, (Maine) 

 in a communication to Hon. Josiah 

 Quincy, pubUshed in the J\Jassa- 



chusetts Agricultural Repository^ 

 vol. IV. p. 353, observes, '' I am 

 persuaded, from experience, that 

 sea sand, put under corn or pota- 

 toes with manure or spread on the 

 land, will go far, if not wholly to 

 the total destruction of those de- 

 structive worms, on which nothing 

 else seems to have any effect. It 

 has a beneficial effect spread on 

 land before ploughing, or even 

 after land is planted with corn or 

 potatoes, not only to destroy the 

 wire worm and other insects, but 

 to increase the crop. With my 

 neighbours a load of sea-sand is 

 considered preferable to a load of 

 the best manure, to mix in with 

 their common barn manure, or to 

 spread on their gardens and low 

 flat land." 



Probably sea-mud, or sea-water 

 would have good effects as pre- 

 servatives against these and other 

 insects. 



The garden jlea is a minute fly 

 that eats cabbages, and other plants 

 of the brassica kind, while they 

 are in seed leaf. They are of a 

 very dark colour, or nearly black. 



1 once applied some clefts of 

 the stems of green elder to some 

 drills of young cabbages, which 

 this fly had begun to eat, and could 

 not find that they eat any after- 

 wards. But as ! made this trial 

 but once, 1 dare not positively 

 assert its efficacy. I would hearti- 

 ly recommend the trial of bitter 

 steeps to gardeners who are trou- 

 bled with this insect. They are 

 earlier in gardens than any other 

 insect ; and 1 have never known 

 them fail to appear in a dry spring. 



Maggots. I have often found 



