IX 



GARDEN PESTS 



THE gardener's hereditary enemies are of two sorts: 

 the insects, which feed upon leaf and flower, 

 fruit and plant juices; and the fungi. The former 

 work in the open, as it were, and are not there- 

 fore quite so difHcult to deal with as the latter, 

 though they are provokingly persistent. The fungi 

 are subtle and more insidious, the spores which pro- 

 duce them being invisible and therefore able to estab- 

 lish themselves in spite of the greatest watchfulness 

 directed against them. With these, prevention is the 

 only **cure"; once a plant falls a victim to the disease 

 which they produce, it is usually fatally stricken. 

 Hence they are more to be dreaded than insects, in a 

 way, and fungicides should be constantly used. 



It is absolutely useless to undertake the battle 

 against insect hordes without first knowing definitely 

 what kind of an army it is that has invaded. For 

 insects that live upon plants are divided into tw^o great 

 classes, according to their method of feeding ; the man- 

 dibulate or biting insects, and the haustellate or suck- 

 ing insects. A campaign to rout them must positively 



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