Pour boiling water on tobacco stems packed tight, 

 and allow it to stand for several hours. Then 

 pour oS the brown liquid and dilute this four times 

 for use on house plants. 



The gardener's standby for fungous diseases, 

 Bordeaux. One tablespoonful copper sulphate, 

 1 1-2 tablespoonfuls quicklime, four quarts water. 

 One tablespoonful of the copper salt equals one ounce 



Put a tablespoonful of fresh pyrethrum powder 

 to two quarts of water for insect pests indoors. 

 Allow it to stand for a -while before using. If the 

 powder is stale it will be of no value 



Spray Formulas in Terms of Kitchen Utensils — By w. c. o'Kane, s 



A GUIDE FOR THE HOME GARDENER WHO WANTS TO USE STANDARD 

 REMEDIES, BUT ONLY NEEDS TO MAKE A GALLON OR SO AT A TIME 



New 

 ampshire 



DID you ever watch a patch of promising 

 muskmelons in your home garden 

 shrivel away to a brown desolation in three 

 days' work of the downy mildew? They 

 have done it in mine, more than once. 

 Through May, June and July the vines 

 throve, and the young melons grew stouter 

 and fuller of promise. But with each 

 August the little patch came to nothing, or 

 at best matured a scanty crop of doubtful 

 quality. 



It was easy to tell when the mildew 

 started. It would have been easy to check 

 it. Bordeaux mixture promptly applied 

 would have turned the trick. Furthermore, 

 there was a small sprayer available, and the 

 ingredients for making up the mixture were 

 at hand. 



But there was the difficulty of measuring 

 out and mixing up the small amounts of 

 material needed. A gallon of Bordeaux 

 would have been ample for my whole garden, 

 and my neighbor's, similarly troubled. But 

 how go about it to make up such a foolishly 

 small quantity? 



Now, expert advice on spraying is easily 

 to be had by any of us. Your state experi- 

 ment station publishes complete and reliable 

 bulletins that are yours for the asking. The 

 United States Department of Agriculture, 

 Bureau of Entomology, issues many valua- 

 ble publications. 



But state stations and the United States 

 Department are maintained for the benefit 

 of farmers. Their formulas are based on 

 wholesale operations. The standard of 

 measurement is usually the barrel — fifty 

 gallons. That's a small amount for the 

 man with a thousand trees. But it's over- 

 whelming for the man with half-a-dozen 

 melon vines: like hauling out a fire-hose 

 to water a potted geranium. 



Just use, you say, the proper fractional 

 part of the amounts called for in the for- 

 mula. Well, how would you go about it to 



measure out one-fiftieth of four pounds of 

 copper sulphate? Not having a set of 

 chemist's balances handy, would you guess 

 it for a teaspoonful or a cupful? The reg- 

 ular, standard formulas are here given in the 

 quantities that you and I are apt to need in 

 our home garden. The amounts are expres- 

 sed throughout in terms of every household — ■ 

 the teaspoon, the tablespoon and the mason 

 jar. You will need nothing to measure with 

 or to mix with. 



If possible, in measuring and mixing your 

 spray materials use old utensils and keep 

 them apart for this use. Put them in a 

 safe place. You may use good silver and 

 glassware, and afterward wash it clean, 

 but wash it very thoroughly, in hot water. 

 Arsenate of lead, especially, sticks tight. 

 It is this fact . that makes it particularly 

 valuable as an insecticide: rain does not 



The standard remedy for sucking insects — kero- 

 sene emulsion. Cube of soap one inch square, one- 

 half pint of water, one pint kerosene ; mix -with 

 egg-beater 



294 



wash it off readily. Bear this fact in mind 

 when you measure out this arsenate. 



BORDEAUX MIXTURE 



This is undoubtedly the best known and 

 most widely used combination for the control 

 of fungous diseases. Among the fungicides 

 it occupies a position like that formerly held 

 by paris green among the insecticides, 

 before the introduction of lead arsenate. 



In your garden you'll need it for 

 anthracnose of the bean and cucumber, 

 for leaf spot of the beet and currant, for 

 early and late blight of the potato, and a 

 dozen other ills. Don't forget that any 

 fungicide is a preventive rather than a cure. 

 It must be applied early, before the disease 

 has made a good start. 



Standard Formula. The regular formula 

 now in general use calls for four pounds of 

 copper sulphate, four to six pounds of quick- 

 lime, and water to make fifty gallons. 



To Make One Gallon. Take one heaping 

 tablespoonful of copper sulphate; one and 

 a half rounding tablespoonfuls of quick- 

 lime. 



This is the equivalent of one ounce of the 

 copper sulphate and one and a quarter ounces 

 of the quicklime. If your copper sulphate 

 is in large crystals, break them up with a 

 hammer until there are no pieces larger than 

 one-fourth to one-half inch. The lime 

 must be fresh, not air-slaked. It should be 

 pounded up fine with a hammer, unless you 

 buy it already ground up. 



Dissolve the copper sulphate in one quart 

 of warm water. Place the lime in a separate 

 vessel, and slake it slowly with a little water. 

 After it stops bubbling add enough water 

 to make one quart in this vessel. 



Now pour your quart of copper sulphate 

 solution and your quart of lime solution 

 together into a bucket — but do it this way: 

 pour a little from each into the bucket and 

 then stir, then a little more from each and 



