THE STRAWBERRY 



A MONTHLY MAGAZINE DEVOTED TO THE INTERESTS 

 OF STRAWBERRY PRODUCTION IN ALL ITS BRANCHES 



Volume II No. 3 



Three Rivers, Mich., March, 1907 



$1.00 a Year 



for calculation. 



most pressing horticul- 

 al problem of the time 

 that of protecting field 

 I orchard fruits from the 

 destructive influences 

 of insect pests and 

 fungous diseases. 

 Every man who 

 grows fruit knows 

 approximately what 

 good soil, well filled 

 h plant food, and set 

 out with strong and vigorous vines or trees 

 will do; and he can count with reasonable ac- 

 curacy upon what may be expected from the 

 weather, taking a series of years as his basis 

 Market conditions for first-class fruit always 

 are strong, and he is assured in advance a good price for all of 

 the high-grade fruit he can put upon the market. But insects 

 and fungi! Ah! there's the rub! 



Civilization brings with it a train of problems — whether they 

 be wholly evil only time may tell. The swift ships that ply 

 the deep seas between our own and other lands, and make in- 

 tercourse between strange peoples easy to the point of common- 

 placeness; the limited trains that annihilate distance, so quickly 

 do they take us from one point of our country to another — thee 

 results and agencies of modern civilization have made the tran - 

 mission and propagation of insects and fungi quite inevitable, 

 and the result is that today scarcely a section of our country but 

 is more or less affected by one or many of these enemies to 

 plant life. 



WHAT this means in dollars and cents is suggested by the 

 statement made by Prof. M. V. Slingerland of Cornell, 

 at the recent convention of New York fruit-growers, when he 

 declared that the loss sustained by the state of New York alone 

 from the ravages of insects amounted to $70 annually for each 

 farm in that state. As in 1900 there were, in round numbers, 

 260,000 farms in the Empire state, it is readily seen that the 

 sum reaches the appalling total of $16,000,000 for New York 

 alone. Extend this over the entire country, and the results are 

 even more startling. According to the most recent census fig- 

 ures on fruit (report for the season of 1899, as shown in United 

 States Census Report, 1900) New York's production of frui: 

 represented in that year just about one-eighth of the production, 

 in value, of the entire country, or, to be exact, 12.1 per cent. 

 Multiplying $16,000,000 by eight we have a total loss to the 

 fruitmen of the country from insects alone of $128,000,000 each 

 year. This sum doubtless has increased since those figures 

 were gathered, first, because of the rapid increase in the area 

 devoted to fruit of all kinds, and second because of the rapid 

 increase of insect pests during the last seven years. For in- 

 stance, the San Jose scale now affects orchards in thirt\-nine of 



New York State's sixty counties. The scale was slightly known 

 in that state in 1899, we are sure, though we have no statistics 

 at hand on that subject showing how rapidly it has spread. 



These figures and facts concretely set forth a condition that is 

 practically universal and steadily growing worse as the fruit 

 industry expands in magnitude. We have no data as to the 

 relative loss sustained through fungous diseases, but as these are 

 more insidious, and develop at most unexpected times and 

 places, they command quite as serious and persistent attention 

 as do the insects that destroy. 



WHAT is the remedy.' Eternal vigilance and the spray 

 pump, is the answer of every practical fruit grower. As- 

 suming that the losses for 1906 from insects amounted to 

 $150,000,000 and from preventable fungous diseases half as 

 much more — a total of $225,000,000 — it is interesting to spec- 

 ulate how much of that tremendous waste and loss might have 

 been saved by an expenditure of that sum in spraying machin- 

 ery, insecticides, fungicides and in the labor of applying them. 

 Remember that this loss is annual, while an investment in a 

 good spraying outfit ought to cover the first cost of the work for 

 many years. Certainly a modern spraying outfit, carefully 

 operated and protected from the weather, ought to last, with 

 slight and inexpensive repairs, at least ten years. At the Ne^v 

 York meeting referred to the question was discussed, Will a 

 man with ten acres of apples be justified in buying a power 

 sprayer.? The consensus of opinion was that such an invest- 

 ment was justified by an orchard of that size. And why is not 

 the suggestion made by L. R. Bryant, so long the efficient sec- 

 retary of the Illinois State Horticultural Society, one which 

 opens up a large opportunity to enterprise;' In an article in this 

 issue of The Strawberry Mr. Bryant points out the need of 

 commercial spraying outfits, with which trained men would go 

 from orchard to orchard an from field to fi H praying trees 

 and vines at a price, just as threshing ourfits now reduce the 

 expense and labor of grain farming. 



BUT suppose fruitmen will not spray? Suppose that they 

 refuse to perform a work so manifestly in their own inter- 

 est, and of such vital importance to the general pubiic' In the 

 case of aff^ected animals the Federal government and State gov- 

 ernments have been swift to act and to act solely with a view to 

 the public good, killing without compunction or delay entire 

 herds or flocks. In the case of humans who are afflicted with 

 malignant contagion, there is no hesitation in enforcing seques- 

 tration and fumigation, no matter how painful or annoying the 

 procedure may be to the individual. It is a principle of law 

 that the man who sets the fire, even though it be upon his own 

 premises, is responsible for the loss that may result to his neigh- 

 bor. This principle of the priority of the common weal is so 

 well established and now so universally recognized that there 

 appears to be no good reason why it should not be applied 

 strictly to the case we are now considering. Every state should 



