CHAPTER XIV. 



THE SPRAYING OF FRUITS. 



THE most important advance in the management of fruit 

 plantations within the past quarter-century has been the re- 

 markable increase in the means of checking the ravages of 

 insects and fungi by the use of liquid sprays. The spraying 

 of orchard trees with poisons for the purpose of destroying 

 insects is, at least in its modern development, of American 

 origin. Arsenic in the form of Paris-green was early used 

 against the potato-beetle, and in 1872 Le Baron, State ento- 

 mologist of Illinois, suggested its use upon trees for the de- 

 struction of the canker-worm.* As early as 1876, this poison 

 had attained to some popularity as a means of combating the 

 canker-worm in Illinois and in Michigan, in the latter State 

 under the advocacy of Prof. A. J. Cook. It appears to have 

 been as late as 1878 that the first record was made of its use 

 in New York, but a most important discovery followed the 

 experiment there. In the spring of that year, J. S. Wood- 

 ward, of Lockport, advised Edward P. Haynes to spray his 

 apple-trees with Paris-green to destroy the canker-worm. In 

 the fall, Mr. Haynes observed that the apples upon the 

 sprayed trees were less wormy than those upon the others. 

 The results of the experiments were reported the following 

 winter before the Western New York Horticultural Society at 

 Rochester. It is a curious fact that similar results were ob- 

 served in this very year in Iowa in sprayings made with 

 London-purple, under the auspices of Prof. J. L. Budd and 



* See Lodeman, " The Spraying of Plants," for a complete history and dis- 

 cussion of spraying. 



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