324 THE COMPLETE FARMER 



in the summer, and therefore cooped some time before they 

 are eaten. Every body knows with what avidity ducks 

 seize on the tumble-bug, {acarabceus carnifex,) and it is pro- 

 bable the curculio is^ regarded by all fowls as an equally de- 

 licious morsel. Therefore it is that the smooth stone fruits, 

 particularly, succeed much better in lanes and yards where 

 poultry run without restraint, than in gardens and other in- 

 closures, where fowls are excluded.' 



Instead of turning swine into orchards, to pick up the 

 fruit which falls, and thus destroy the worms which it con- 

 tains, it will often be found most expedient to gather such 

 fruit, and give it to swine in pens, &c., either raw, or, what 

 would be better, boiled. If such measures were generally 

 taken with fruit which falls spontaneously, as to prevent the 

 insects, which generally cause it to drop prematurely, from 

 escaping into the ground, the worms, which destroy one- 

 half our fruit, and very much deteriorate a considerable part 

 of the other half, would soon be extirpated from our orchards 

 and fruit-gardens. 



Aphis, Plant-louse, Puceron, or Vine-fretter. ' This genus 

 of insects comprises many species and varieties, which are 

 so denominated from the plants they infest. The males are 

 winged, and the females without wings ; they are viviparous, 

 producing their young alive, in the spring ; and also ovipa- 

 rous, laying eggs in autumn. Water, dashed with force 

 from a syringe, [or garden engine,] will prove as destructive 

 to them as any thing, when on trees ; and smaller plants 

 may be washed with lime-water, with tobacco-water, with 

 elder leaves infused in water, or with common soap-suds, 

 any of which will destroy the insects.' — Loudo7i. ' Tie up 

 some flour of sulphur in a piece of muslin, or fine linen, and 

 with this the leaves of young shoots or plants should be 

 dusted, or it may be thrown on them by means of a common 

 swan's-down pufT, or even a dredging box. Sulphur has also 

 been found to promote the health of plants, on which it was 

 sprinkled, and that peach trees, in particular, were remarka- 

 bly improved by it.' — Domestic Encydopedia. 'In green- 

 houses, they are readily destroyed by the smoke of tobacco, 

 or of sulphur : but in the open air, fumigation, though much 

 in vogue many years since, is of no avail. The best remedy 

 is the simplest. Soap-suds, forcibly applied, will, after one 

 or two applications, effectually destroy them, without appa- 

 rent injury to the plant.' — Deane. 



A writer for the New England Farmer, vol. iii, p. 9, after 



