The White Grub oe the May Beetle. 29 



grub, I will refer to but one other, which I regard as an effectual 

 one, wherever it may be resorted to : 



Starvation. — As soon as the attack is discovered, upon the 

 removal of the crop, collect and burn, as far as practicable, all the 

 vegetable material upon which the larvae could feed. If the 

 ground has been cultivated for vegetables, gather all the stalks, 

 stems, vines, etc., together with the roots, in piles, and burn them. 

 If the land be in grass, after feeding as closely as possible, plow 

 thoroughly, and follow during the autumn with such additional 

 plowings and harrowings as shall best tend to destroy all vegetable 

 life. At this time, gas-lime, if procurable, should be applied. 

 Repeat these operations in the following spring, and allow the land 

 to lie fallow for the year. Compliance with these directions would 

 not only starve out the white grub, but also whatever wire- 

 worms, cut-worms, and other underground larvae there might be 

 present. 



The fallowing of the land for an entire year may be found to be 

 unnecessary. It is not improbable that it might be preferable 

 that the thorough breaking up of the ground in the autumn and 

 spring be followed with a crop of buckwheat. Wonderful efficacy 

 has been claimed for this plant, in freeing the ground from wire- 

 worms — the larvae of other beetles, and we know not why it may 

 not be equally efficient when employed against the white grub. 

 By all means, let thorough tests of its value be made, since the 

 trial is so simple. Hon. A. B. Dickinson, after experimenting 

 with salt and lime for destroying wire-worms, has stated : " I have 

 only proved one remedy for the rascals, and that is, to break the 

 sod and sow it to buckwheat ; plow late and as often as possible 

 in the fall, and then sow it to peas in the spring ; with the like 

 plowing next fall, they will not disturb any crop the next season." 



In England, a crop of mustard is regarded as an antidote against 

 the wire-worm. In an address before an agricultural society there, 

 the speaker, after detailing some successful experiments upon a 

 small scale with mustard, stated as follows : " Thus encouraged by 

 these results, I sowed the next year a whole field of forty-two 

 acres, which had never repaid me for nineteen years, in conse- 

 quence of nearly every crop being destroyed by the wire-worm ; 

 and I am warranted in stating that not a single wire-worm could he 

 found the following year, and the crop of wheat throughout was 

 superior to any that I had grown for twenty-one years." Certainly 



