254 
HORTICULTURAL DEPARTMENT. 
^ortintlfural JDepartmmt. 
BY L. F. ALLEN. 
MULCHING-. 
We have talked somewhat of mulching, and 
particularly as applied to newly-planted trees 
and shrubs. The philosophy we consider to be 
this: Recently-removed, and newly-transplant¬ 
ed roots are tender, and particularly sensitive 
to harsh treatment. They may be compared 
somewhat to amputated or wounded limbs of 
the animal body, which require more attentive 
treatment and increased care beyond the healthy 
and perfect limbs maintaining their natural 
growth and condition. Torn rudely from their 
natural bed, and lacerated in removal as they 
usually are, and transplanted into a different 
soil from which they previously occupied, a 
thorough revolution is made in their habits. In¬ 
creased care is therefore required in their cul¬ 
tivation until they have become habituated to 
their new condition. They require an equable 
degree of temperature and moisture. Mulching 
screens them from the violent excesses of a fer¬ 
vid sun; it preserves an equable moisture; it 
retains the gases and salts of the ground, oth¬ 
erwise escaping from the powerful action of the 
sun on the roots, thus soothing and knitting 
them into new life in their struggles for exist¬ 
ence and growth. The every-day examples of 
the more rapid growth of young trees under the 
shade of a fence or stone wall is a practical 
demonstration of this, and the superior fertility 
of soil under such fence or wall in which the 
various elements of fertility within it are pre¬ 
served by their shade, over what are to be found 
in those parts of the field exposed to the scorch¬ 
ing rays of the sun ; and the washing from the 
heavy rains, are additional proofs of the bene¬ 
fits to be derived from mulching, which is in 
fact, the same principle differently applied. The 
air can equally as well penetrate through and 
beneath the mulch as through the soil; and as 
a matter of economy, mulching has an absolute 
advantage over ordinary cultivation in keeping 
down weeds and all noxious growths. Added 
to this, our own experience of the effect in giv¬ 
ing increased growth and health to mulched 
trees and shrubs, over those not so treated, give 
this practice, in our judgment, a greater value 
than any mode of procedure, with newly-plant¬ 
ed roots, whatever; and even in old plantations, 
where increased stimulus is necessary, nothing 
which we have ever tried has been so potent in 
its improving effects. We recommend it with¬ 
out stint or measure, to all who are engaged in 
either fruit or ornamental tree or shrub planta¬ 
tions. 
Of one thing, in all mulching practice, do not 
fail. If your grounds are ever infested by mice, 
the mulching must be removed as early as Sep¬ 
tember, by which time the usual season’s growth 
of new wood will have been made. If it is left 
later in the season, it will serve as a harbor for 
vermin, and they will inevitably destroy the 
bark of the stem, and consequently the tree or 
shrub itself. Let the mulch be spread one, two 
or four feet from the stem, as the size of the 
tree may warrant, and all the better, if it reach 
out as far as the roots may spread into the sur¬ 
rounding soil. 
-- 
ORCHARD CATERPILLARS. 
Nothing so defaces an orchard, as the cater¬ 
pillar, and certainly nothing of the insect kind 
can be more destructive, if permitted to prey 
upon it. The sooner they are destroyed after 
making their appearance, the better. The rem¬ 
edy is simple and expeditious. 
Take a stick of the necessary length to reach 
their nest from the ground; drive two shingle 
nails crosswise through the small end within an 
inch of the point. Early in the morning, or in 
a rainy or lowery day, when the worms are all 
snug in the nest, take up your line of march 
among the trees. Be provided with a little 
spatula, or paddle, made of a shingle or a ma¬ 
son’s trowel, if you have one. Poke the stick, 
nail end up, into the nest, wind it round care¬ 
fully two or three times, and the nest and cat¬ 
erpillars with it will all be entangled in the 
nails. Draw it down to you. With the point 
of your paddle, or trowel, disengage the nest, 
and then crush them with its flat blade upon the 
bole of the tree. If the expressed juice of the 
worm does not make the bark softer, the cater¬ 
pillars will eat no more leaves. Hundreds of 
nests may be thus destroyed in a day. 
Many people think the birds will destroy the 
caterpillars. Sometimes they do; but few birds 
like these coarse, hairy creatures. They much 
prefer earth worms. And when they are so 
easily destroyed, it is hardly worth while to 
leave that for the birds which can be so much 
more effectually done by the hand. 
The small August caterpillar which weaves a 
large web over several branches of the tree, 
enclosing both leaves and fruit as it progresses 
in search of its food, is more destructive than 
the early caterpillar ; but its treatment may bo 
the same. All remedies of sulphur, soot, ashes, 
and lime are uncertain. When you know the 
