I883.J 



THE LANCASTER FARMER. 



133 



!is they arc doing witli mc, but such hosts of 

 certain species of insects I iiave never before 

 seen. 1 had noticed in the impprs for scviiral 

 years, tliat in some sections some Ifiiul of 

 a worm vvas(lefolialiiijj;lhe curraut and i;oose- 

 l)erry buslies, but only last year I noticed 

 some of tlie leaves on a single gooseberry stalk 

 af(nvoftbem eaten off l»y some insec'l, but paid 

 no attention to the matter. This siiininer, 

 however, these worms came in countless 

 tbou.sauds and eat off every leaf on all our 

 currant and gooseberry shrubs. They only 

 apveared when the fruit was full grown, so I 

 did not venture to make use of poison, and 

 the red currants on a row through the gar- 

 den, SO feet long, hung on the bushes fully ex- 

 posed to the solar heat, and did not ripen 

 properly. A writer in some paper says, strong 

 soap-suds will kill or drive them away. If 

 this eating oft' the leaves will continue for a 

 few years, the bushes will die. I fear we will 

 . have to say " good bye " to current pies, jelly 

 and currant wine. 



A worm on the grape vines is also in millions 

 eating the leaves. The worm I have seen a 

 few every year but never knew them to eat 

 more than a leaf here and there, but this season 

 they take all the leaves for yards on the trellis. 

 I pull of the leaves where I see them and 

 crush them under foot. Thousands have I 

 killed in this way, but it don't appear to les- 

 sen their number, nor their voracious appe- 

 tite in the least. The little gall insects on the 

 underside of the leaves too are more numer- 

 ous than ever. 



Apparently a new insect has made ils ap- 

 pearance on the wheat, just before harvest ; I 

 have not seen it, but they tell me that a worm 

 an inch to an inch and a half long, crawls up 

 the stem, bites off the ear, which drops to the 

 ground. The worms then crawl down another 

 stem, performing the same operation over and 

 over again until the ground lays full of wheat- 

 ears— doing much damage in spots. 



Apple worms, codling moths and worms at 

 the roots of trees, are also more numerous 

 than ever before. Then the "yellows" on 

 peach trees are sweeping that fruit from the 

 county, and the early peaches all rotting. 



And as to apples, such knotty fruit as we 

 now have, and dropping from the trees half 

 grown — hardly fit for hogs to eat — I have 

 never seen before this season. Fruit growing 

 is getting to be a precarious business. 



But on the other side we have no potato 

 bugs to do injury, aud there will be a large 

 crop of " murphies," which is some con.sola- 

 tion, at least to those who arc fond of the 

 tubers. 



Cabbage worms, tpo, are very few, and we 

 may hope for a large return of cabbages, and 

 l)lenty of sourkraut. 



fSciuash bugs arc nowhere, but the vines of 

 squashes, calabash and cucumbers, are run- 

 ning " to the end of creation," if there is an 

 end, but produce no fruit as in former years. 

 Celery is growing raraiiant, and weeds are not 

 slow. 



In general, a prolific season for vegetation 

 of most kinds of vegetables, also weeds and 

 grass, but fruit is scarce. Fears are bearini; 

 a fair crop, are cracking and dropping liom 

 the trees, half grown. Plums, ox ut^ual, of no 

 account, aud grapes bearing only half a crop, 

 and will probably not come to their usual per- 



fection on account of those worms eating off 

 the leaves. Our ]{artlet pears are lying thick 

 on the ground, half grown, and none on tlie 

 trees. 



Hut you may say "I am getting oft' the 

 track," as this was to be an insectiverons 

 letter, still as insects and vegetables, as well 

 as fruit and grain, arc necessary for insect 

 life, it is natural to notice them together. But 

 what is the world, or at least this locality, 

 coming to ? If these insect pests continue to 

 increase, and every year bringing us new 

 ones, will, in a short time, have neither fruit 

 nor vegetables for human sustinance ; but it is 

 useless to anticipate the evils we know not of, 

 for to predict the "good and evil" in store 

 for us in the future, we might be placed in the 

 same category as the weather prophets who 

 pretend to tell us what the weather will be a 

 year or a day in advance. 



" Sufticientfor the day are the evils thereof. " 

 Respectfully. J. B. Gakbek. 



Columbia, Pa., August, lss;i. 



[The apparently new insect on the wheat was 

 probably tlie " white lined army worm," and 

 those on the gtape vines the " C4rape Flea 

 beetle," the American Procris," or the 

 "Grape Saw-fly." This loose allusion to 

 insects in August and September, which 

 ought to have been attended to in the earlier 

 part of the season cannot end in very satisfac- 

 tory results, for, at best, we only can guess 

 what insects arc meant. — Eu.] 



Selections. 



PEAR BLIGHT. 



The growing of the pear in grass as a pro- 

 tection against blight, must lie upon the prin- 

 ciple that cultivating the soil stimulates a 

 more copious flow of sap. In our mind, it is 

 an excessive supply of sap, nncarbonized, that 

 in a sulti-y, still time starts the blight. Grass, 

 so far as keeping the ground cooler, checks an 

 excessive flow of sap. Our experience is that 

 grass tends to keep or causes the ground to 

 become dryer. And that also is a check to 

 an excessive flow of sap, at a time when the 

 atmosphere is not in motion, but still and not 

 coming in rapidly-changing contact with the 

 trees, leaves and branches, enough to carbon- 

 ize its sap. A*, such times we think that the 

 newly-formed cells are surfeited to bursting. 



The submitting of a healthy vigorous 

 growing pear branch to artificial heat, equal 

 to the atmospheric heat that they often have 

 to pass through, its effects upon the leaves 

 and soft tissues of said branch will be exactly 

 like that of the natural blight. Small patch- 

 es of blight at the base of limbs, while the 

 balance of the pear tree seems perfectly 

 healthy aud vigorous, I regard as indicative 

 of a previous hot, still condition of atmos- 

 phere at a time when there was a large How 

 of .sap, the weather changing, breezes spring- 

 ing up and giving relief by enabling the leaves 

 to utilize .sap before the bursting of the new 

 sau-cells became general and the blight ex- 

 tensive. • 



The pear is a native of a northern climate, 

 and is said to flourish at 57 degrees of North 

 latitude, and even that far north it mav not 

 be exposed to as great extremes of cold as 

 with us. As I am told that in Denmark, 5.j 

 degrees North, there is seldom snow enough 



to run a cutter, and seeding is at times done 

 by Christmas and New Year, and yet Den- 

 mark lies from ten to fifteen degrees north of 

 us. 



Subject a vigorously-growing pear tree 

 branch to a certain degree of low temperature 

 or so subject it even after' the saj) has com- 

 menced movement therein in the spring, and 

 the eft'ecls will be jirecisely that of pear-blight. 

 Hence, it is suggested that to avoid as much 

 as po.ssible the pear-blight, is to avoid, as 

 much as possible these extremes in their 

 plaTiting, and in their culture and their too 

 rapid growth. 



Ye,.rs airo I was informed that charcoal 

 dust mixed in the soil about pear tree roots 

 was the best preventative for pear-blight. I 

 have since been told by those who have given 

 it a fair trial that with them it had proved a 

 success, and not one have I heard claim that 

 he had given it a fair trial, and that it had 

 not been successful. 



[ have just read Henry AVilbur's article on 

 "Blight-proof Pears," and then came up the 

 question, "what varieties that are generally 

 cultivated blight soonest, or are more subject 

 to blight, than the Bartlctt, Clapp's Favor- 

 ite and Flemish Beauty ?" It woidd be a 

 source of information to find such a list in the 

 Telryraplr, also the increasing of the "Blight- 

 proof Pears" list over the Duchess, Seckel, 

 BeurreClairgeaii and Winter Nelis. Can Mr. 

 Wilbur, or any other reader of the Tdetjraph, 

 add to said list V — Z. C. Fairbanks, in Oemvxn- 

 town Telegraph. 



FEEDING VALUE OF EWSILAGE. 



We have inquiries concerning the feeding 

 value of ensilage, some of which show some 

 confusion of mind in regard to the subject. 

 Bearing in mind a few general principles will 

 help to a better understanding. 



First — The value of food preserved in a silo 

 depends very greatly on what was put in — its 

 nature and condition. The material used and 

 the degree of maturity of the crop will greatly 

 affect the value. 



Second — PuttiTig grass, cornstalks or other 

 substance in a silo does not add anything to 

 the nutriment contained in the material. We 

 cannot tiike out what we did not put in. 

 Cutting and storing the green food in a silo 

 may make it more digestible ; may and often 

 does make it more palatable' than when the 

 food is dried in the open air. I^elting the 

 moisture dry from the meadow grass or from 

 green cornstalks in itself, should not make 

 these substances loss desirable as food. In 

 fact it docs make them less palatable. Pre- 

 serving much of this moisture in the ensilaged 

 food may be a belj). 



Third — If fermentation goes on in the silo 

 to any considerable extent there is absolute 

 loss of food value. 



Fourth — Reason and experience alike lead 

 us to conclude that we cannot make ensilaged 

 grass or cornstalks alime fully take the ijlace 

 of good grain feed. The latter should be 

 given in connection with the former. 



Fifth — Reas(m and exi)erience alike show 

 that almost any palatalile, nutritious, succu- 

 lent plant, kept in a silo, with reasonable ex- 

 clusion of the air, makes a palatable and fairly 

 satisfactory food. — Breeder''s Gazette. 



