FLORIDA STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 
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Next came a little hand spray pump. 
With these pumps half a dozen men 
sprayed the trees from pails, while a horse 
hauled barrels of water from some con¬ 
venient lake. What was used for an in¬ 
secticide at this time, I do not know, but I 
remember seeing them churn ‘‘kerosene 
butter” with these little pumps and it was 
made of kerosene oil and “Eagle Brand” 
condensed milk. 
All this fighting appeared to do no 
good and the scale was still there, although 
I am not prepared to say that the spraying 
was properly done, or done at the proper 
time, for spraying orange trees was a 
comparatively new thing at that time. 
In 1884 I was sent away to school and 
when I returned three years later, I found 
that father had gotten up the rig which 
I am now using. This is a four-wheeled 
wagon, with a three barrel tank and a 
force pump geared to one hind wheel of 
the wagon. This throws a strong spray 
and I spray from five to twenty-five acres 
per day with one hose. 
Our main fight is against the rust mite 
and we use the sulphur solution, but when 
we spray regularly for that we have never 
been troubled with scale, except one of the 
wax scales which cause “smut” and this is 
always killed with one application of 
double strength. 
We start spraying the first of May and 
spray the first of every month for five 
months and the result, until last season, 
has been clean, healthy trees and bright 
fruit. Last spring we had purple mite 
enough to damage the trees and drop a 
large part of the fruit, therefore about 
the first of January of this year, seeing 
the mite starting again, we sprayed once 
and intended to continue it to keep them 
in check, but have found it unnecessary. 
The spraying destroyed a large per cent 
of the mites and this, followed by the cold 
of January 25th and later by an unusual 
amount of rain, has almost destroyed the 
mite. 
One of the finest groves in our section, 
well known as the “Pet Grove,” property 
of Mr. J. P. Felt, is greatly damaged by 
what appears to be “foot-rot.” We have 
many groves here which, like this one, are 
budded on sweet stock. In this grove a 
part of the bank was allowed to remain 
for two or three years, so that the earth 
close to the tree was six to ten inches above 
the natural collar even through the sum¬ 
mer and I have no doubt that this was the 
cause of the “foot-rot.” Mr. Felt is hav¬ 
ing this earth removed now and th’e trees 
will probably not be banked next winter 
to give them a chance to heal. 
Grape fruit trees have been damaged 
some by scab and the fruit made unfit for 
market. Spraying with Bordeaux Mix¬ 
ture appears to entirely prevent this, as 
trees badly affected two years ago were 
sprayed last spring and last season pro¬ 
duced fine fruit and the new growth was 
free from disease. 
My idea of combating diseases of trees 
is, first to prevent it if possible; then, if it 
appears, cure it if you can. Study the re¬ 
quirements of the trees and make the con¬ 
ditions suitable as far as possible and 
above all give them plenty of food of the 
very best quality, then watch your trees 
closely and be ready to meet trouble when 
it comes. 
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