OUR RIVALS—THE INSECTS 
preventable. It is not impossible, by scientific 
methods, to double the produce of our fields and 
orchards. We are just waking up to the fact that 
ten acres, brought to their best use, are as good 
as one hundred acres under ordinary tillage and 
care. The largest leakage is from the rivalry of 
creatures whose lines of bread-winning cross ours. 
Mark you, I do not call these insects our enemies; 
they have no constitutional desire to injure us, they 
are only doing just what we are trying to do, win a 
living and propagate their species — multiply and 
possess the land. If we enter the struggle with 
them it will give us healthy competition, and de- 
velop character as well as secure food. 
I shall not undertake a treatise on moths, cut- 
worms, and saw-flies, but will try to give you a help- 
ful chapter that will carry you through the ordi- 
nary fight in garden and orchard. The snow will 
not have melted in the woods before we shall find 
need for spraying pumps and poisons. A barrel 
of Bordeaux Mixture is the first necessity. Give - 
your orchard, your lawn trees, and your garden — 
everything but your evergreen trees and hedges — 
a thorough application at once. The currant 
worm is a product of the saw-fly, and its first eggs 
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