384 



THE GARDENERS' CHRONICLE. 



[June 15, 1912. 



of Early Prolific was not a great one, and 

 probably the tremendous infestation of the aphis 

 was not commonly experienced. Monarch bears 

 a mere sprinkling of fruit very commonly, 

 while Czar is generally well up to the mark. 

 With respect to Apples, a friend in Suffolk has 

 the same partial failure of Bramley's Seedling 

 and Lane's Prince Albert as was mentioned last 

 month as having occurred with me, while we both 

 have remarkably good sets of Worcester Pear- 

 main and some other varieties. 



Disappearance of Caterpillars. 



* 



The grower referred to above mentions the dis- 

 appearance of caterpillars from Apple trees as 

 having decided him not to spray them with 



present are among the trusses of blossom-buds, 

 rather than on the embryo leaves. But later on 

 they are on the leaves, which curl over them as 

 soon as the attack has well started. Soft soap 

 and quassia were included with arsenate of lead 

 in my second summer spraying, in the hope of 

 controlling the aphis attack, which was begin- 

 ning to be a serious one ; but the infestation 

 could not be worse than it is if these ingredients 

 had been excluded. Moreover, search was 

 made for dead aphides, and hardly any could 

 be found, although many live ones were seen in 

 places which the spray should have covered, 

 namely, on leaves not yet curled. The explana- 

 tion is that these pests have oily skins, which 

 throw off anything short of a drenching. The 



start below the cut will have time to mature 

 sufficiently to stand through next winter. 



Lime-sulphur as a Summer Wash. 



Many of my varieties of Apples were sprayed 

 with lime-sulphur and arsenate of lead in the 

 second spraying since the foliage began to ap- 

 pear. To one gallon of Voss's lime-sulphur 

 solution 40 gallons of water were added, 1 lb. 

 10 ounces of arsenate of lead being included. At 

 this strength hardly a trace of scorching fol- 

 lowed, except in the case of some unhealthy 

 Cox's Orange Pippin trees. Young, healthy trees 

 of the same variety were not harmed by the wash. 

 A trial of strength of l-30th on one tree each of 

 Early Julyan and Cox's Orange Pippin showed 



Fig. 182. — rock and water garden exhibited at the international exhibition by 



MESSRS. R. WALLACE AND CO. 



arsenate of lead as he had intended. This sur- 

 prises me, because most of the caterpillars which 

 I had found were only half-grown, and, there- 

 fore, could not have pupated so early. But shak- 

 ing violently the branches of many trees, the 

 leaves of which had been damaged by cater- 

 pillers, failed to bring any down, and some 

 caterpillars certainly would have fallen if they 

 had been on the trees. Perhaps this indicates 

 that birds are more serviceable to fruit growers 

 than some of us suppose. 



Wasteful Spraying. 



This season's experience has finally persuaded 

 me that it is pure waste of time and money to 

 spray against the leaf-curling aphis. A little 

 killing may be done when trees are sprayed to 

 kill the Apple sucker, as the few aphides then 



(See p. xiv. of Exhibition Supplement in the issue for May 25.) 



stem aphis is much easier to kill than either of 

 the two varieties which cause the leaves to curl. 



Aphis Attack on Young Trees. 



This attack is particularly distressing, because 

 it does much to stunt the growth and spoil the 

 shape of young Apple or Plum trees, particularly 

 when one of the leaf-curling species is the in- 

 vader. There is a very bad attack on young 

 Apples this season, and spraying has proved use- 

 less to control it. The only remedy is the 

 tedious one of stripping off the curled leaves and 

 crushing them, at the same time killing fresh 

 migrants found, one, two or three in a place on a 

 , leaf not yet curled. When this work is done 

 before the end of May, there is the great advan- 

 tage that if a young shoot badly twisted by the 

 attack is cut back, the fresh growth that will 



not the slightest injury to the former, but some 

 scorching on the latter. One gallon to 40 gallons 

 of water appears to be the proper dilution of a 

 solution as strong as the one named, which 

 tests 32 on the Baume scale, equivalent to 1.283 

 specific gravity. 



Scorching by Soft Soap. 



More attention to the composition of soft soap 

 than appears to be given is needed, as I have had 

 this season for the first time some bad cases of 

 the scorching of the foliage of Apples and Plums 

 clearly due to this ingredient of a wash, presum- 

 ing that quassia cannot scorch. The soap was 

 used at the rate of 4 lbs. to 40 gallons of water, 

 a strength often exceeded with impunity when 

 using other samples of the article. A Southern 

 Grower. 







