METHODS FOE THE FARMER. 



195 



moth than the general farmer or fruit grower. The well-to- 

 do market-gardener who raises little or no fruit has few trees 

 on his land to care for ; his methods of cultivation are inten- 

 sive, and he is obliged to employ a number of field hands 

 in his business. He is therefore better able to protect his 

 crops against the attacks of an insect like the gypsy moth 

 than is the general farmer or the small farmer who has to 

 depend largely on his own labor. There would be less 

 danger to the interests of the agriculturist in thickly settled 

 districts where market-gardening is carried on than in thinly 

 settled sections where farms are larger and less highly culti- 

 vated, where much wood is grown and where there are many 

 orchards. In such regions the waste and wooded land, where 

 the moth might breed and where little could be done by the 

 owners to check it, greatly exceed in area the cultivated 

 land, where its ravages would do the greatest injury. 



In considering, then, the means most useful to the farmer 

 for controlling or exterminating the moth, we niust choose 

 those most readily available to the general farmer of moder- 

 ate means. 



Burning the eggs or killing them by means of creosote or 

 other oils are the methods which can be used most effectually 

 by most farmers. The work can be done during the late 

 fall, winter and early spring, — a time of the year when 

 most farmers are not overburdened with the labors and cares 

 incidental to planting and harvesting. If this is thoroughly 

 done in an orchard, there need be no fear of the fruit crop 

 being destroyed in the ensuing summer by the gypsy moth 

 unless the orchard is invaded from without by caterpillars 

 which have bred in the woods or upon shade trees. 



If shade trees are near the orchard, all the orchard trees 

 cleared of eggs should be banded with insect lime or supplied 

 with tree protectors, either of which will go far toward 

 protecting them from the inroads of migrating caterpillars. 

 But if there is a tract of badly infested woodland near the 

 orchard, the bands will be of little use in protecting the 

 trees against the invasion of the multitude of caterpillars. 

 In such cases the most economical plan would be to cut 

 down all the infested woods and burn over the ground. Few 

 farmers can afibrd to attempt to keep the pest out of wood- 



