750 
plant of the melon-aphis would seem to 
be the best measure to adopt, if possible; 
this winter harbor has not fully been 
determined for some points, 
The Pickle Worm 
There have been many complaints from 
growers in the southern part of the 
United States of injuries from this worm. 
Careful inquiry has been made to find the 
best information on this pest, but there 
is no known remedy as yet, other than 
the general precautions of clean farm- 
ing, rotation of crops and fall plowing; 
in the more northern melon districts 
the attacks of this insect are apt to be 
only periodical, which is true with nearly 
all insects; they appear in waves; one 
year they may be very destructive and the 
next season will hardly be seen, so there 
is no need of giving up because there 
have been insect pests one year. The 
eggs of the larvae of the pickle worm 
are deposited on the buds and tender 
Shoots of the plants, and as the young 
worm hatches it feeds in the angles of 
the stems and leaves, and if the plants 
were well sprayed with arsenate of lead 
the first broods would be largely held in 
check, and subsequent sprays might be 
profitable. 
Plant Diseases 
Crop rotation, seed selection, or breed- 
ing for disease resistance offer the best 
means of controlling plant diseases; the 
spraying of the crop with Bordeaux mix- 
ture or other fungicides is about the 
only other means at hand. In Colorado, 
spraying has not proven as successful as 
it is reported to be in other states, doubt- 
less due to different climatic conditions. 
Careful control of irrigation seems to 
offer one means of lessening the attacks 
of some of the fungus troubles in the 
arid sections under irrigation. 
Harvesting 
After all injuries to the crop have been 
explained and remedial measures suggest- 
ed, there still remains one great cause 
of poor returns from the cantaloup crop, 
viz., careless and unscrupulous methods 
of marketing. When cantaloupes are 
scarce and sales are quick, there seems 
to be no power on earth that will stay 
ENCYCLOPEDIA OF PRACTICAL HORTICULTURE 
the hand of the average grower as he 
pushes his crop onto the market, with 
the encouragment of advices from his 
progressive (?) commission merchant; 
together they have produced a glutted 
market with inferior products; instead of 
protecting the markets with a quality that 
would increase consumption, they simply 
let it fill up with everything and any- 
thing, and neither the grower nor the 
consumer is benefited. It is common for 
growers to admit that they are shipping 
cantaloupes that are not fit to be eaten, 
and it is not strange that a similar com- 
plaint comes from the consumer. Not till 
the grower is honest with himself, should 
he expect good returns. 
Picking 
When green or over-ripe melons are al- 
lowed to go onto the markets, the trou- 
ble usually is in the picking; careless or 
mistaken ideas often prevailing. There 
is a@ very narrow limit in the stage of 
ripeness that a cantaloup can be picked 
and have it in the right condition for 
distant markets. On one hand, it cannot 
be picked as green as a tomato or lemon, 
and still ripen during shipment to fair 
quality, nor, on the other hand, can it be 
allowed to show any distinct color of 
ripeness, like an apple, without it be- 
comes too soft on long shipments. 
It should be ripe enough so the flesh 
will be sweet when cut open, yet too 
hard to be eaten for a day or two; it re- 
quires skill and experience to determine 
the proper stage. 
Jocularly it has been said: “The canta- 
loup has three stages in three days— 
green, ripe and rotten.” This expresses 
the fact that there is a very short period 
for marketing the crop in good condi- 
tion, yet if picked at the proper stage, 
and handled right under refrigeration it 
can be shipped to distant market in quite 
normal condition. 
It is hard to describe to a novice just 
how to detect the right stage to pick a 
cantaloup; there is, first, a very slight 
change of color in the interstices of the 
netting, hardly enough, however, to at- 
tract the attention of the inexperienced; 
second, it is tried with a pressure of the 
