294 



Forty- FOURTH Report on the State Museum 



Jarring" for the Plum. Curculio. 



Some of our orchardists and fruit-growers still find it profitable, 



even in connection with spraying, to collect the curculio by jarring 



from the trees. Mr. J. M. Kandall, of Dey's Landing, Seneca county, 



N. Y., has written to me as follows, under date of May 23d, of his 



crusade against the insect : 



We have been fighting the plum curculio since the 18th of this 

 month. We found none the day before, but on that morning, follow- 

 ing a warm night, killed one hundred and thirteen. The next morn- 

 ing we killed forty-nine, and the following morning the same number. 

 Bain fell on the 20th, and since the 21st we have caught none, owing 

 to the wet weather. The above record is for an orchard of 525 four- 

 year-old plum trees, which is surrounded on the north and south by 

 apple orchards, on the east by quinces, and on the west by a vineyard. 

 We catch more of the curculios next to the apple orchards and down 

 through the middle of the plum orchard. More are found when the 

 nights are warm and with an east wind. 



Although the best method of jarring for the curculio has often 

 been published in our agricultural journals, it may be well to give it 

 here : 



Kod iron of about three-eighths of an inch in diameter, is cut in 

 pieces three inches long. With a brace-bit of the same diameter bore 

 a hole of an inch and a half in depth, at convenient reach, in each of 

 the principal limbs of the tree (if it be a large one) and drive in the 

 iron. A sharp blow with a hammer upon the head of the iron, which 

 should be flat, will at once bring all the curculios down upon the 

 sheet spread for them beneath, or upon the curculio-catcher held in 

 the hand, if one has been prepared. 



An excellent apparatus for the purpose, convenient for orchards of 

 moderate size, is the following: Take a square of two yards white 

 muslin, or if a larger size is needed for larger trees, make a piece by 



sewing together two by three yards, 

 or larger. Stiffen it with light rods 

 across the ends, and with one rod 

 at the middle to keep them apart 

 and to serve as a handle, as shown 

 in the figure. Let it be a little 

 slack, so as to give a slightly con- 

 cave form to the sheet. Iron plugs 

 having previously been inserted in 

 the tree, or into each main branch, 

 the operator holds this sheet in* his left hand under one side of the 

 tree, and strikes the plug with a heav}^ hammer in his right hand. 

 The curculios caught upon the sheet may be turned into a pan of 



Fig. 23.— Cuboulio-catchee. 



