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by dropping cotton or dirtying it with earth or smudging it with 
the sap from the fruit. Attempts have been made to replace hand 
labour by machine labour in plucking, but without satisfactory 
results. 
After the cotton has been plucked, the remainder of the plant is 
used as fodder, which is equal in strength to wheat straw. 
Animals are fond of the cotton plant in any stage of growth but 
not when the shrubs have died, or dried and become tasteless. 
The tough stems which are not eaten by the animals are made 
into fibre. ' These are woven into a kind of sack-cloth which is very 
suitable for the making up, of the bale; of cotton. 
Diseases and Plagues. 
The diseases which endanger the cotton plant are of three kinds; 
a. Diseases, due to physiological causes, amongst these are 
the mosaic-disease or the yellow-leaf disease: the autumn 
leaf or red-leaf disease : the falling of fruits etc. 
Diseases caused through fungi to which belongs amongst 
others the root-rot; cotton-leaf disease, mildew, fruit-rot; 
etc. 
c. Nematode-disease ; root-gall. 
The greatest loss is caused the cotton planter by insects. The 
most dangerous of these being the cotton-caterpillai ( A letia argil- 
lacea. Hubn.) The caterpillar which eats the fruit [He ho this Amu- 
oer. Hubn.) causes also a lot of damage yet not by far to such a 
'degree as the first named. 
The loss of the cotton-planters, due to the cotton-caterpillar 
amounted to yearly 37,5<-0,ooo guilders, and that not so very long 
ago. In some years this amount has even been surpassed. 
This plague has now practically been mastered by having a more 
rational culture and suitable remedies. 
In the first place the _otton planters do not exclusively plant then- 
fields with cotton but plant besides cotton, grain and fodder plants 
on other parts of their land. 
Since the cotton plant has proved to be valuable as fodder as 
well as for the oil industry it is not the custom now as it was once, 
to grow that kind of cotton which has few seed and long hairs. 
Owing to the value of the seed the kind having a higher per- 
centage^ them is now usually planted although this gives less 
cotton yet the loss is amply made up for by the other profit. 
The form and growth of these shorter varieties permit of a better 
combat with the caterpillars. The plantation is more open. The 
caterpillars become more conspicuous and cannot hide themselves 
in the bushy parts, as is the case in the other kind. 
Besides a dusting with Paris green is used with good success. 
The manner of dusting is very simple, it is done with the help of 
two bags hung on a stick held across a horse. In this way one 
man can’ easily manage 8.5 to H. 4 bouws per day. Next to the 
cotton caterpillar, the fruit-caterpillar (Heliothis armiger. Hubn.) is 
the most harmful. 
