r>a« 
THIS RURAL NEW-YORKER 
May 14. 
THE OYSTER-SHELL BARK LOUSE. 
Apropos to your article in relation 
to Oyster-shell bark louse on page 493, 
1 offer my practical experience. Five 
or six years ago I discovered portions of 
my apple orchards quite badly infested 
with the Oyster-shell bark louse, espe¬ 
cially two Baldwins of 12 years’ growth, 
that finally gave up the ghost. On ad¬ 
vice of the Geneva Experiment Sta¬ 
tion, I sprayed all infected trees very 
thoroughly the fore part of June with 
whale-oil soap at a ratio, as I remember, 
of one pound of soap to seven gallons 
water, with the result that the following 
Spring I had more lice than the preced¬ 
ing year. I then consulted with our 
State Entomologist at Albany, who ad¬ 
vised practically the same treatment, ex¬ 
cept that I was to watch the trees closely 
the latter part of May, and when a 
majority of the young white lice were 
hatched to spray with the whale-oil 
soap. I accordingly did so, spraying 
very thoroughly with a mixture of eight 
to 10 pounds soap to 50 gallons water. 
There is no question in my mind but 
that the spray killed all the young lice 
it hit, but how about those not yet 
hatched, and safely ensconced under 
their impervious shell ? Why, as I was 
unable to be there to turn the nozzle 
daily on them for two weeks, I found 
that when Autumn came they had in¬ 
creased instead of diminishing. 
The whole trouble in getting them 
with whale-oil soap lies in the fact that 
they hatch out so unevenly, there being 
a difference of at least two weeks both 
in individual trees as well as scales, so 
that unless one was able to give re¬ 
peated sprayings, covering a period of 
two weeks or more, he would not kill 
them all and would be liable to burn 
the foliage of the trees by the repeated 
sprayings. That Autumn I met Prof. 
Craig, of Cornell, at a farmers’ picnic 
in our vicinity, and by his advice 
sprayed the' trees the latter part of 
March, following with the homemade 
solution of lime and sulphur, 35 pounds 
sulphur, 25 pounds lime, boiled one hour 
and water added to make 50 gallons of 
spray, and put on quite warm. As to 
results, by the following Fall I was 
unable to find any live lice or shells on 
trees sprayed with the lime and sul¬ 
phur ; in fact, but a few days after 
spraying most of the shells would read¬ 
ily brush off. The lime and sulphur has 
also been used by several of my neigh¬ 
bors for the same pest, with equally 
gratifying results. Although I have no 
San Jose scale, I have such faith in 
the lime and sulphur that we have 
sprayed our apple orchards again with 
it this Spring to clean out trees pre¬ 
viously unsprayed, and to kill eggs of 
the apple aphis which was so prevalent 
here last season. I know that some of 
the authorities do not consider the 
Oyster-shell bark louse much of a men¬ 
ace to fruit growers, but I do not agree 
with them, nor do I think you would 
cither if you could have seen those two 
fine Baldwins they killed for me. 
EUGENE SPALDING. 
Greene Co., N. Y. 
DIRECT TAXATION. 
On page 434 H. H. Lyon states that 
we have no direct State tax. I think 
if he will take the trouble to look up 
the question of taxation in New York 
State, he will change his statements. A 
part of the canal bonds and good roads 
bonds are payable each year by direct 
State tax, so I am informed' by the 
county treasurer. I think that farms 
are taxed for every dollar they would 
bring at public auction; then, if the 
taxes are not paid by such a date, the 
State charges eight per cent interest for 
about four months besides over four 
per cent for collecting and advertising 
and sale expenses. I know, for I have 
bought at tax sales. School taxes are 
separate from State and county taxes. 
They run about one-third of what the 
State and county taxes are. If A. E. F., 
Radnor, Pa., wants to buy a New York 
State farm, he can find out all about 
the taxes by having the last tax re¬ 
ceipts or a copy of the same sent with 
a description of the farm. Better still 
to go and personally inspect both the 
farm and buildings and tax question 
before buying, as some towns are over¬ 
burdened with taxes, while others have 
a very reasonable tax rate. It is a ques¬ 
tion of honest town officers a great 
many times as to how high the taxes 
are. A. j. t. 
Chemung Co., N. Y. 
I am glad A. J. T. has brought up 
this question, as it gives me a chance 
to correct one error that I made on page 
434. There are certain court expenses 
that are collected by direct tax. In this 
county it amounts to a little over a 
thousand dollars, or something like 25 
RAILROAD FIRES. 
I send a clipping from Watertown Daily 
Times of April 18, in which goes to show 
that there is some chance of sparks from 
the railroad setting fires. I am an old 
railroad man, and have seen a box car 
burned in the train before it could be 
saved by being set from sparks from the 
engine. It is a foregone fact that this 
lire at Adams. N. Y., was started from an 
engine, but the correspondents did not 
dare write too strongly against the rail¬ 
road. “The origin of the fire is unknown, 
but the prevalent belief is that sparks 
from a locomotive started the fire. One 
of those first upon the scene said that a 
train with sparks issuing from the smoke¬ 
stack of the engine passed but a short time 
before the blaze was discovered. Inasmuch 
as the railroad track lies but a few yards 
cast of the Webster plant, it would have 
been an easy matter, with tire wind in the 
southeast, for the sparks from the locomo¬ 
tive to blow over on to the roof of the 
sawmill where the fire was first seen.” 
H. m. w. 
cents for a man who has a 20-dollar tax 
to pay. The rest of our taxes are for 
local purposes, town and county. For 
the purpose of verifying this statement, 
I wrote the Comptroller’s office at Al- 
baii}’, and received a reply from the 
Comptroller himself, in which he states 
that “the total cost of maintaining the 
government of the State of New York, 
including the annual contributions to 
the sinking funds to pay for highway 
and canal improvement bonds at ma¬ 
turity, has been met from revenues de¬ 
rived from taxes on corporations, trans¬ 
fer of decedents’ estates, stock transfer 
taxes, excise fees and various other 
sources.” He also mentioned the court 
expenses, as I have already stated. I 
think I also stated on page 434 that it 
is not clear that there never will be any 
direct tax for State expenses in this 
State. As a matter of fact, I greatly 
fear that we will have direct State 
taxes before very long. I am not in a 
position to know that, however. As to 
whether farms are taxed at what they 
will bring at public auction, is another 
question. The law provides that as¬ 
sessments shall be made on real estate 
at full values and that the value shall 
be fixed at what a willing buyer and a 
willing seller might agree. It is not 
clear that farms are assessed as high as 
that. I am not experienced in the mat¬ 
ter of tax sales, as our farmers here 
pay their taxes before forced collection 
is necessary. The other points in A. 
J. T.’s note are much as I stated before. 
I would emphasize his advice to a man 
to investigate as fully as possible be¬ 
fore purchasing a farm. h. h. lyon. 
WIREWORMS. 
We receive almost daily requests for 
some good remedy for wireworms in corn. 
Q’he entomologists have given little, hope 
that the pest could be fought practically 
except by “baits” of poisoned vegetables, 
bran or clover spread through the fields. 
Thorough cultivation helps. We sometimes 
have reports of the use of salt or wood 
ashes, but these or other chemicals arc of 
little value unless you use so much that 
you injure the soil or wipe out any profit. 
Now comes a new treatment, which has 
been tried in New England for two sea¬ 
sons with entire success. It is reported by 
Prof. H. T. Fernald, of Massachusetts Ex¬ 
periment Station : 
“In brief, the treatment consists of 
tarring the seed as is often done to keep 
crows from feeding upon it. The seed was 
then placed in a bucket containing fine 
dust and Paris green mixed in such pro¬ 
portions that the corn, after being shaken 
up in the bucket, showed a greenish color. 
The corn thus treated fed properly through 
the seeder and in every case came up 
satisfactorily, while check rows were badly 
injured. Examination of some of the corn 
thus treated, after about a week, showed 
that the wireworms were present close by 
the seed, but that they did not molest the 
seed itself, apparently being repelled rather 
than destroyed by the treatment. It was 
evident that the germination of the seed 
was not affected, and it is probable that 
the Paris green was present in sufficient 
quantity to prove a fatal dose for crows 
which might attack it. Soaking the seed 
in strychnine and other poisons gave far 
less satisfactory results than the one just 
given. Further experiments may , perhaps 
develop defects in this method, but none 
has as yet appeared, and it seems desir¬ 
able to test it on a large scale in different 
parts of the country.” 
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THE RIGHT ROOF. 
An Important Part of Every Building Often 
Hastily Decided Upon—Merits of Slate 
and Other Roofings Discussed. 
Edward Hall, in a “Treatise on Build¬ 
ing and Ornamental Stones.” puts the 
case thus: “Slates are chiefly used for 
roofing houses and public buildings, and 
are valuable in proportion to their com¬ 
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quality and incapacity for -absorbing 
water.” 
Prof. J. L. Stone, New. York State 
College of Agriculture at Cornell Uni¬ 
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air and changes of temperature. Slate 
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tin; strong—like iron; and so on. But 
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Iron rusts. Jt is worthless in ten years. 
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