506 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



Nov. 



riculture, aided by science, yields enough for any 

 man's desires. We have begun to find that there 

 is no place for the rich man in the kingdom of rest 

 and peace. He then particularly spoke of the vis- 

 ible result of agricultural labor, and said this was 

 not only palpable, but comparatively certain. He 

 thought the thirst for political distinction had been 

 one of the greatest curses of the farmer. He 

 dwelt at some length on the aid God gave the 

 farmer, and the imjjortance of taking advantage 

 of this, and closed a fine address by appropriate 

 quotations from the Proverbs of Solomon. 



A very well written poem for the occasion was 

 then read by the author, Francis P. Denney, Esq., 

 which was loudly applauded, when brief respon- 

 ses to sentiments were made by Rev. Dr. Thomp- 

 son, Judge Thomas, E. L. Pierce, Esq., of Milton, 

 and a humorous report of the Committee on Swine 

 was read by Capt. J. S. Sleeper, of Roxbury. 



BROOKLYN HORTICULTUBAL SOCIETY. 



The number of the Hortimdiurist for Septem- 

 ber is before us, as fair and attractive as usual. It 

 has excellent articles upon several interesting top- 

 ics. In its account of the Brooklyn Horticultural 

 Society it gives part of a report of Di*. Trimble's 

 address on insects injurious to city trees, from 

 which we make the following extracts : 



The Ichxeumox. — The Ichneumon animal eats 

 the eggs of the crocodile, to some extent control- 

 ling its numbers. 



The cuckoo in England and the cow bunting in 

 this country, lay their eggs in the nests of other 

 birds, and the young are nurtured by foster moth- 

 ers ; and it is said these parasite intruders have 

 the instinct to throw the rightful possessors out 

 of their nests. By such a process these foster par- 

 ents would be lessened the next year — a law that 

 would react upon the parasites in the future ; and 

 we see that none of these birds become numerous. 

 The ichneumon insect is a four-winged fly, and an 

 immensely numerous class, of all sizes and exceed- 

 ingly irregular and eccentric in shape. Tliey are 

 the great regulators of insect life. 



The female deposits her eggs in, and the young 

 feed upon, the living bodies of other insects. 



It is the fatal enemy of many other insects ; flies 

 in their larva state, and even the eggs of some in- 

 sects, are destroyed by them, but the caterpillars 

 arc the great suflerers. You may often see feeble 

 looking ones, studded over the back with little 

 protuberances ; these ai'e the cocoons of the para- 

 site grubs that have fed to maturity upon the flesh 

 of the ])oor worm, and leaving just vitahty enough 

 to last as long as it is necessary for them that they 

 should live. These little creatures, when full 

 grown, issue from the substance of the poor cater- 

 pillar, spin their cocoons and attach them by silk- 

 en cords to their miserable victims. (Here the 

 Doctor showed a specimen with eighty cocoons at- 

 tached, and from which he had collected the flies.) 



Many insects prey upon each other ; sometimes 

 diseases diminish them ; birds destroy incredible 

 numbers ; toads cat them : froijs and fish consume 



vast numbers of the larva of the submarine varie- 

 ties ; but such is the incredible rate of increase, 

 that many kinds would overrun us, but for the 

 wonderful check of this parasite class. The news- 

 papers often report fearful numbers of some new 

 insect, and forebode dreadful consequences. Such 

 insects are troublesome for a short time, and then 

 disappear. Some observe a periodicity, as the Lo- 

 cust, the Chaff'ers and Ephemerae, but most of them 

 are checked by the Ichneumon. 



I have seen the stems of grapes cut ofl" in great 

 numbers by a caterpillar, and I attempted to see 

 M'hat butterfly it would come to, but I got only 

 large, fierce looking Ichneumon flies, two from 

 each. 



Our pine forests are saved from serious injuiy, 

 and the lumber from damage, by the friendly in- 

 terference of an Ichneumon insect that stings the 

 borer, while just under the bark, during the peri- 

 od of its transformation. 



I once knew an eccentric person make a calcula- 

 tion, that the undisturbed increase of a single her- 

 ring would, in twenty years, more than equal the 

 solid earth, and he became nervous with the idea 

 that we were all to become herrings. He forgot 

 that in addition to the hundreds of enemies that 

 prey upon these fish, besides ourselves, that the 

 cachelot whale feeds upon them, and takes in 

 2,000 at a single mouthful. No. Nothing here 

 is allowed to take exclusive possession. Of the 

 hundreds of thousands of varieties of insects, none 

 become extinct, and none are permitted to prepon- 

 derate to a dangerous degree for any length of 

 time. 



When meteors and comets jostle the planets 

 out of their places, and the heavenly system be- 

 comes disturbed, it will be time enough to antici- 

 pate that God has forgotten to regulate the insect 

 world. 



GIRDLED TREES. 



Mice often produce sad havoc in young orch- 

 ards and nurseries by gnawing the trunks near the 

 surface of the ground, and not unfrequently for a 

 considerable distance above it. This may often 

 be prevented by compressing the first snows that 

 fall about them, by stamping and keeping them as 

 hard as possible until spring. If, however, from 

 neglect or any other cause, trees do get injured 

 in this way, watch the opportunity, and as soon 

 as the frost leaves the surface, bank them up 

 with soil to the extent of the injury, and allow the 

 same to remain till the subsequent year. A new 

 deposition of granulated matter will thus be in- 

 duced, and this becoming in due time liquified, 

 the surface will appear nearly as smooth as before 

 it was injured. It will be well, however, before 

 banking up to dig the soil thoroughly, if the frost 

 will admit, and to the extent of the lateral limbs, 

 and work in a liberal quantity of old, fine manure, 

 mixed Mith a little ground bone, ashes or plaster 

 to each tree. This will stimulate action, and 

 cause a more rapid and abundant deposition of 

 granular substance to heal and conceal the wound, 

 and be otherwise beneficial to the tree. Those 



