INSECTS. 27 



whether it was necessary to sow celery in the hot-bed ? 

 these and many other similar questions the Colonel, with 

 a little prompting on my part, managed to answer to his 

 own satisfaction, and I hope to the satisfaction of my 

 correspondents. But one man wanted to know the best 

 way to kill Cabbage-worms ! I was busy at the time and 

 the Colonel thought he would not bother me, and so he 

 wrote somewhat as follows : "Dear Sir The best way 

 to kill Cabbage-worms is to shoot them. Eespectfully 

 yours, Joseph Harris, per B." 



I do not know who my correspondent was, and do 

 not know whether he applied the Colonel's remedy. No 

 one but a military man would have suggested it. The 

 real trouble is to know where to shoot. It is certainly 

 useless to attack in this way the worms themselves, but if 

 the Colonel meant to have a few days sport with a double 

 barrelled shot-gun, in shooting on the wing the white 

 butterflies which lay the eggs that produce the green 

 Cabbage-worm, the remedy might be popular with the 

 boys. Killing the butterflies, or catching them with 

 nets, is the true way to get rid of the Cabbage-worm. 



On my own farm I do nothing to check the ravages of 

 the Cabbage-worm except to dust the plants while the 

 dew is on, with a mixture of plaster and superphosphate, 

 say two parts of plaster to one of superphosphate. I am 

 not sure that it lessens the number of worms, but at any 

 rate it stimulates the growth of the plant, especially if 

 you hoe the mixture into the ground around each plant. 

 The only practical remedy I have ever tried is heavy 

 manuring and thorough cultivation, and setting out 

 plants by the thousand, instead of by the hundred. 



THE USE OF POISONS. 



With melons, cucumbers, and squashes, the Striped- 

 bug is a great pest. We all get angry enough at them 



