MA^FTERS OF GENERAL IMPORTANCE IN 

 BOG MANAGEMENT 



A PLENTIFUL WATER SUPPLY for flooding whenever necessary is a good and 

 cheap insurance against insect injury on cranberry bogs, and should be 

 provided if the cost is not prohibitive. Where a water supply is lacking or its 

 use is for any reason impracticable, dusting, spraying, sanding, or other measures 

 must be adopted. 



Special attention should be given the various pests in those years when the 

 crop prospect is poor. If they are properly reduced then, they often may be 

 neglected safely when the crop promises to be heavy. Such treatments as flooding, 

 sanding, ground-machine dusting, and spraying are likely to injure the vines more 

 or less and so reduce the crop. The amount of this reduction usually is 

 proportional to the crop promise. Limited water supplies for reflooding often 

 should be saved for protection from frosts, and other methods of control used 

 against pests. 



Bog managers should learn to gauge insect infestations in their early stages 

 so as to know when attacks may be neglected. The insect net is as important 

 as any other bog equipment. The bogs should be examined with it every few 

 days from May 10 till mid-July. For practical purposes the sweeping with the 

 net may be done at any time of day, though it usually collects rather more cut- 

 worms and gypsy moth larvae as soon as the dew is off in the morning and just 

 as it begins to form in the evening. If fifty sweeps of a net eleven inches in 

 diameter gather from the vines over eight gypsy moth caterpillars or cutworms 

 of any kind, or more than thirty-two spanworms, the infestation should be treated, 

 four spanworms equaling one cutworm in their capacity to do harm. As the 

 worms of many of the species grow larger they cling more and more to the vines 

 or hide under them and so are gathered by the net in smaller and smaller numbers. 



The worms that float ashore during flooding treatments seldom give any trouble. 

 Usually most of them thrash themselves to death in the water or die from 

 exhaustion or infection if they crawl ashore. 



Bogs should never be burned off to control insects unless the vines are so deep 

 and snarled that their renewal is desired. Even then it is often better to mow 

 them. 



Cranberry insect problems present so many conditions that it is hard to 

 cover them all fully in bulletins. Chances to check two or more pests with 

 one treatment should always be looked for. Those that occur commonly are in- 

 dicated in the discussion of the various insects. The insect control chart issued 

 yearly by the extension services of Plymouth and Barnstable counties is helpful 

 here. 



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