Tenth Annual Meeting 95 



kerosene. Whale-oil soap, while it forms a good remedy when 

 applied at the rate of two pounds to the gallon, yet when it 

 is applied at that rate the peach buds will sufifer; so, in peach - 

 growing sections you must discard that method. Refined kero- 

 sene diluted with water gives very good results, but the time 

 of the year must be carefully considered, and not only the 

 time of the year, but the place where your orchard is located. 

 In some cases the effect of spraying with 25 per cent kero- 

 sene was not so good, but it was due not so much to the 

 proportion of the mixture of oil and water as to mechanical 

 defects in the spray pump. Many trees have been destroyed 

 by this imperfect dissemination of the oil and water. Spraying 

 with a 25 per cent solution of refined kerosene has been very 

 successfully done early. There is a climatic condition entering 

 into this problem. A moist, damp atmosphere is detrimental 

 in every case where you spray with a 25 per cent solution of 

 refined kerosene. So you must bear that in mind. Further- 

 more, there is a difference in locality, so far as the state of 

 the buds are concerned. These conditions are atmospheric, 

 locality, or geographic, and seasonable. You must consider all 

 of those points, — -atmospheric, geographic and seasonable. For 

 example, if you compare the buds from a mountain tree taken 

 on the same day as buds from a tree on the Maryland Eastern 

 Shore, on tide water, you will see a great difiference. It would 

 be at least two weeks before the buds of the same variety, or 

 of those two varieties , would be in the same condition. There 

 is a condition which you must consider carefully in spraying 

 every time. From the standpoint of location, after all, the 

 whole thing resolves itself to one problem, and that problem 

 is the man himself. 



Put the right kind of a man back of these enterprises of 

 fruit-growing, and the San Jose scale, or anything else in that 

 line, cannot run him out of the business. He is there to stay. 

 When we find that we can control the San Jose scale with 

 such material as whale-oil soap, refined kerosene, gas and 

 crude petroleum, the future appears much brighter. It will 

 come back from time to time in all probability, but working 

 with the natural forces which nature has provided, and with 

 the artificial means for its destruction which science has 



