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115 
Notes from the Experiment Stations. 
At the Mass. Agric. College Station a re- 
cent test has been made by Prof. S. T. May- 
nard of the comparative protective value 
of different materials for the construction of 
Greenhouse Walls. 
To determine the value of greenhouse 
walls constructed of different materials as 
a protection against the weather, four sec- 
tions, six feet long by four high were con- 
structed in the new greenhouse recently 
erected. 
Section 1. Concrete, (Rosendale Cement, 
one part to three parts of sand). 
Section 2. Hollow brick, nine inches 
thick. 
Section 3. Framed hollow wall covered 
with lining boards, building paper and 
sheathing on the outside, and the same 
without the paper on the inside. 
Section 4. Same as section 3, but the 
space was filled with dry pine shavings. 
In each of these walls was made a space 
five inches wide and one foot long running 
to the centre, in which were placed ther- 
mometers so protected as not to be affected 
by the inside temperature of the house. 
Other thermometers were placed on the in- 
side surface of the walls similarly protect- 
ed from inside temperature. 
The temperature of each kind of wall, 
both inside and surface, was recorded at 
7.30 a.m., 3 p.m., and 9 pm. Much has 
been said and written as to the protective 
value of the building materials commonly 
used in the construction of greenhouse 
walls, but generally without facts or figures 
to substantiate the statements. 
After careful observations extending from 
January 9th to March 1st, the following 
conclusions were reached. 
1st. That on the inside of the wall, the 
lined board walls, filled with shavings, give 
the best results, that with the hollow space 
being but little less valuable. 
2nd. That hollow brick and concrete 
walls are about equally valuable in protect- 
ing from cold, but not equal to the framed 
and board walls. 
As to the cost of construction there can 
be but little difference, and the important 
question of durability can only be determin- 
ed after ten or fifteen years’ service. 
• 
Prof. J. H. Comstock in a recent Bulletin 
of Cornell University Experiment Station 
gives the conclusions reached concerning 
Tlie Destruction of the Plum Curculio 
by Poison. 
“One of the most important results to 
fruit-growers, of recent studies in economic 
entomology, is the demonstration of the 
fact that injury to plums by the Plum Cur- 
culio can be prevented, to a great extent, 
by spraying the trees early in the season 
with Paris green or London purple mixed 
with water. This fact, I believe, was first 
ascertained by practical fruit-growers, who, 
finding good results from the use of Paris 
green against the Codlin Moth, jumped to 
the conclusion that the Plum Curculio 
could be destroyed in the same way. At 
the time this was done the known facts in 
the life-history of the Plum Curculio did 
not warrant any such conclusion. In truth 
the entomologists were mostly inclined to 
say that injuries by this insect could not be 
prevented by an application of Paris green 
to the trees. It was urged that, as the eggs 
of the Curculio were placed within the tis- 
sues of the fruit, the newly hatched larvae 
would be beyond the poison applied to the 
surface. In this respect this insect differs 
from the Codlin Moth, which lays its eggs 
upon the outside of the apple at the blos- 
som end, in such a way that the young 
larva when eating its way into the apple is 
liable to be poisoned, if poison has been 
sprayed upon the tree. 
Notwithstanding this important difference 
in the habits of the insects, certain fruit- 
growers claimed that equally good results fol- 
lowed the spraying of plum trees as in spray- 
ing apple trees. At last the matter has been 
made the subject of careful experiment by 
Mr. C. M. Weed, the Entomologist of the 
Ohio State Experiment Station. The results 
of Mr. Weed’s experiment are very striking. 
They seem to show, so far as the results of 
a single season’s work with a single variety 
of cherries can be relied upon, ‘that three 
fourths of the cherries liable to injury by 
the Plum Curculio can be saved by two or 
three applications of London purple in a 
water spray (in the proportion of one ounce 
to five gallons of water) made soon after the 
blossoms fall.’ 
No explanation is made by Mr. Weed as 
to the way in which the poison acts, — 
whether the adult beetles are destroyed be- 
fore they lay their eggs, or whether the 
poison reaches the young larvae. During 
the present season we have made some ob- 
servations and conducted an experiment 
which indicate that the former is the case. 
During the latter part of the past summer 
my attention was attracted to a serious in- 
jury to the fruit in an apple orchard 
through which I passed daily. A large pro- 
portion of the apples in one corner of the 
orchard had been eaten into by something 
which made small pits from one-eighth to 
one-fourth inch in diameter, and of about 
the same depth. On one tree nearly every 
apple had been attacked, and in many cases 
there were ten or twelve holes in a single 
apple. The injury was so serious as to ren- 
der the fruit on this part of the orchard 
unmarketable. 
The holes in the apples were first observ- 
ed during the latter part of August. At 
that time many of them were partially 
grown over, while others were fresh, indi- 
cating that the pest had been at wmrk for a 
considerable time and was still active. As 
the injury to the apples resembles somewhat 
that caused by Lithophane antennata, a 
climbing cut-worm, that sometimes infests 
apples in Western New York, I at first 
searched for caterpillars and gave little 
thought 1o the Plum Curculio that I fre- 
quently found hiding in the holes in the ap- 
ples. But after finding a considerable num- 
ber of these insects in these pits, it occurred 
to me that they might be the cause of the 
mischief. Several perfect apples were then 
selected and placed in breeding cages, in 
each of which were confined several curcu- 
lios. The question was soon settled: within 
twenty-four hours the beetles had begun to 
eat into the apples. They made small holes 
at first, but these were soon enlarged so as 
to form pits of the size indicated above. We 
thus see that the Plum Curculio is a varacious 
feeder, and conclude that the spraying of 
the plum trees early in the season with Par- 
is green water protects the fruit by the de- 
struction of the adult curculio before they 
have laid their eggs.” 
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