52 
FLORIDA STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 
for the orchardist. Therefore the sim¬ 
ple and effective preventative is to plant 
on virgin soils, free from washes from old 
fields. With this simple precaution, and 
planting trees free from the disease, no 
serious annoyance should be experienced 
from this source. 
The next trouble likely to attract 
the peach grower’s attention, will 
probably be the borer. Many are the 
devices that have been invented and reme¬ 
dies tried all of which have proven more 
or less a failure. Of these remedies I 
believe the Porter system of treatment 
the best and most practical. This system 
of treatment as invited by Mr. C. M. 
Porter of Douglas, Ga. and offered by 
him in farm rights, consists of a series 
of mounding, worming and applying a 
caustic wash. We have tried it on our 
own orchards, and from present obser¬ 
vation and status of experiment l^elieve 
it of some value. The method of treat¬ 
ment employed most largely in our own 
orchards and by many of the largest and 
most successful orchardists of the south, 
is the banking around the trees to a 
height of eight to fifteen inches in July 
and August, before the fly deposits the 
egg on the body of the trees. This forces 
him to deposit the egg well up on the 
body. In the fall or early winter this dirt 
is removed,leaving the young larva in the 
body of the tree well up in the air, where 
the bark will harden as soon as the earth 
is removed causing many to perish. 
Would also recoiumend after removino: 
the earth, the scraping the body of the 
tree from the crown roots up to 12 or 15 
inches in height with a sharpedged instru¬ 
ment, this will disturb and kill many more 
of the young larva. The painting of the 
bodies from the crown to the limbs after 
the earth has been removed, with a strong 
caustic solution, will also be beneficial in 
killing many of the larva and preventing 
others that hatch higher up or that have 
been knocked off from entering the bark. 
After these precautions have been taken, 
a few will likely have escaped, dig them 
out with the point of pruning knife, as 
soon as they show themselves by their 
signs, an excretion of a half gummy half 
sawdusty matter from* the point where 
the young larva entered and commenced 
to feed. With these precautions no serious 
trouble or loss should be experienced 
from the borer. 
The next annoyance noticed is likely to 
be Gall knots on the roots and crowns 
and which is generally accepted as Crown 
Gall and if it is the true Crown Gall, I 
consider that it has been much over-rated, 
and especially so by some of the entomo¬ 
logists and pittiologists in some sections. 
Mr. A. C. Weiting Commissioner of 
Agriculture, Albany, N. Y. in an article 
in the National Nurserymen, in discuss¬ 
ing Crown Gall said, “All Galls on the 
roots are not Crown Galls, a distinction 
between them may be made.” He fur¬ 
ther said “the galls caused by aphids are 
usally knotty and very hard, while the 
Crown Gall is rather soft and as easily 
cut as a turnip. Its tissues being brain 
like in formation.” As the knots usually 
found on the peach trees are usually hard 
woody substance covered with thick pul¬ 
py bark and wart-like formation. I am 
very doubtful about the most of it be¬ 
ing the true Crown Gall. This Gall knot 
has by some been confused with the root- 
knot Angoulul'a, and by others with the 
black-knot of the cherry and plum of the 
states farther north. It is entirely dis¬ 
tinct and different from the former, but 
