1914. 
THE RURAI> NEW-YORKER 
880 
Ruralisms 
The Corn Ear-worm. 
C AN you suggest anything to apply to 
sweet corn to prevent the ravages 
of a green worm? The mature 
worm is something over one inch long; 
begins at the small end of the ear and 
eats its way down. It may be found in 
all lengths from one-quarter to one inch 
or more. Would an application early in 
season, of hellebore or acetate of lead 
be of any use? Last year was the first 
that corn has been planted on this land 
(for many years at least). We had the 
same trouble and as I used seed from the 
same house (N. Y. State seed) in garden 
in Connecticut I cannot think the seed 
was infected. G. D. c. 
Montgomery. 
The insect in question is no doubt the 
corn ear-worm, which is variable in 
markings, but usually dull green or 
brownish in color, with a naked greasy- 
looking skin. It does a great deal of in¬ 
jury to a variety of garden and fruit 
crops, being also known, according to its 
host plants, as the cotton boll-worm, the 
tomato fruit-worm, and the tobacco false 
bud-worm. It is extremely destructive to 
sweet corn, less so to field corn. On to¬ 
matoes, they bore into the fruit, and in 
the South they begin to attack cotton- 
bolls when the corn gets too mature for 
them, and also tobacco. The adult is a 
small yellowish brown moth, and there 
are several broods in the season. The 
larva makes a peculiar galleried burrow 
in the ground, in which it pupates, and 
one of the best means of control is Fall 
plowing and cultivating, which breaks up 
these burrows. Early planted corn is 
more likely to escape injury but later 
broods of the insect are difficult to con¬ 
trol. On tobacco buds the worms are 
poisoned with a mixture of dry corn- 
meal and arsenate of lead, one teaspoon¬ 
ful of the poison to a quart of meal, 
sprinkled on dry. The concealment of 
the worm while feeding, as well as the 
danger of using poison on the corn ears, 
prevents any idea of controlling the pest 
in this way, but Fall plowing, diversified 
planting, and the destruction of all cater¬ 
pillars found should keep the insect un¬ 
der control. The late Dr. Smith says the 
worms are savage cannibals, too, and if 
moi'e than one appears on a single corn 
ear, there is a fight which is only fin¬ 
ished by one survivor devouring his com¬ 
petitors. Of course the seed was not in¬ 
fected ; the insects were in the soil, and 
previous crops of cotton, tomatoes or to¬ 
bacco would encourage them. 
Bunching Vegetables. 
C AN you advise me as to the number 
of vegetables put in bunches of the 
various kinds that are bunched, such 
as radishes, onions, rhubarb, etc.? 
Delmar, N. Y. e. n. c. 
When root and other vegetable crops 
that are usually bunched, and put up to 
retail at five cents per bunch, radishes 
should contain 10 to 12, onions five, car¬ 
rots six to eight if small, beets five. Rhu¬ 
barb at the opening of the season always 
produces the heaviest stalks and is usu¬ 
ally bunched three to the bunch; later 
on when size is somewhat reduced, four, 
five and sometimes six stalks to the 
bunch. When intended for the wholesale 
market it is of considerable advantage to 
have these small bunches put up into 
other bunches containing one dozen and 
neatly tied; this will save counting when 
sales are made, and save much time and 
sometimes annoyance when the merchant 
is busy. K. 
High Pressure for Spraying. 
1 BELIEVE I can thoroughly spray 
four-year-old trees in much less time 
and with less material with the pres¬ 
sure at 200 than at 100. I would like to 
get the opinion of some experienced man 
on that point. a. l. d. 
I have talked with several people who 
used power sprayers, and I have myself 
sprayed with them. I would not attempt 
to grow fruit if I had to do the pumping 
by hand. First, because hand pumping 
is too hard work. Second, because more 
work can be done in a day with a power 
rig than by hand. The economy comes 
entirely in a man being able to do twice 
as much or more work in a day than with 
a hand pump. When using a barrel 
pump it will keep one man busy to sup¬ 
ply one nozzle of the disk type, like the 
“misty” or “Winkle mist.” If using a 
force pump, one man can supply two 
nozzles at 100 to 125 pounds pressure, 
but when night comes the pumper knows 
he has done a good day’s work. When 
a power outfit is used at least two leads 
of hose can be used, the rod attached to 
each carrying two nozzles. 
In Bulletin 248 of the Ohio Agricul¬ 
tural Experiment Station, (Wooster) is 
a list of 08 nozzles of different manu¬ 
facture, and their sizes and capacities for 
delivering liquids. In nearly all in¬ 
stances, about one-half more liquid is 
shot through the nozzles at 200 pounds 
than at 100 pounds. For instance, at 100 
pounds pressure the whirlpool nozzle with 
a disk having an aperture of 7/TOO inch 
(.07) will pass 60 gallons of spray mate¬ 
rial in one hour, while at 200 pounds 
pressure 06 gallons can be forced through 
in the same time. An illustration of 
what a small power outfit enables a man 
to do can best be told by the experience 
of one grower. He used a hand outfit 
until last year, when he bought an engine 
and hooked it to his pump. By hand he 
put on six to seven barrels of spray mate¬ 
rial in a day. With his small power out¬ 
fit and only one line of hose he is en¬ 
abled to put on 20 barrels in the same 
time. So if a little material is wasted 
there is such a gain in time—the most 
expensive item in spraying—that the ex¬ 
tra material is more than paid for by 
the greater amount of work accomplished. 
I can see no economy of material in 
spraying with high pressure. In fact, I 
believe from my own experience that un¬ 
less a man is very active there will be 
a waste of material, because of the ten¬ 
dency to hold the rod too long in one 
place, drenching the tree, and the added 
danger from burning of the foliage. 
There is an airtight outfit—a power out¬ 
fit—on the market which throws such a 
misty spray that it is more economical 
of spray material than the other power 
outfits, but I think for the average farm¬ 
er who has only 10 to 20 acres in fruit 
the added use he gets out of his engine 
more than makes up the economy of ma¬ 
terial. B. 
Spittle Insects or Frog-hoppers. 
O UR attention has been called to some 
white specks or bubbles of foam on 
the young Timothy stems, with 
small gold-colored insect in the center, 
this Spring. This was pretty general in 
the Eastern part of Erie County, N. Y. 
Will you let us know what this is, and if 
it is likely to do any harm? p. G. 
Rochester, N. Y. 
The “white specks” or “bubbles of 
foam” referred to are caused by what is 
known as the spittle insect or frog-hop¬ 
per. If the mass of white foam be care¬ 
fully brushed away a small wingless 
green or blackish insect will be found 
lying close to the stem and with its beak 
inserted in the stem of grass. In this 
position it sucks out the juices of the 
plant, and must interfere seriously, at 
times, wit’- the growth of the grass or 
plant attacked. 
Spittle insects are very abundant this 
season, and are seriously injuring pasture 
and meadow grasses, especially Timothy. 
In the tropics these insects are often in¬ 
jurious to sugar cane. Very little is 
known of the life history of the spittle 
insects. In Trinidad, West Indies, where 
certain ones attacking sugar cane have 
been more carefully studied, they seem 
to pass the Winter in the egg stage. The 
eggs are deposited in the leaves and hatch 
in the Spring, and the young bugs at¬ 
tack the cane, injuring it severely. There 
seem to be several generations during the 
season. AVhether there is more than one 
generation of the species that occur on 
our grasses in New York the writer is 
unable to say. 
There have been many theories ad¬ 
vanced to explain the production of the 
frothy material. Some writers have said 
that the plant produced it, others that 
the cuckoo bird put it on the grass, 
others that the insect in the mass ex¬ 
pelled the foam from its beak, while 
others believed the foam was expelled 
from the anal opening of the insect. In¬ 
vestigations at Cornell University made 
in 190S show that a fluid is excreted by 
the insect from the anal opening, and 
that bubbles of air are then mixed with 
it by certain appendages on the abdomen. 
Added to this is a mucilaginous material 
secreted by certain glands of the body. 
This material stiffens the more watery 
fluid and just as gelatine is put in ice 
cream to give it body and stiffness. So 
far as the writer is able to find, no one 
has suggested a reason for the produc¬ 
tion of this frothy material. We would 
suggest that it may act as a protection 
from the heat and drying effect of the 
sun. It is a fact that spittle insects need 
moist conditions for their best develop¬ 
ment and are easily killed when exposed 
to the heat and drying effect of the sun. 
We have very little to suggest in the 
way of control. There is no practicable j 
method of destroying these insects in a J 
meadow and still keep the grass standing, j 
If the grass, however, is cut early before ! 
the insects become full grown they will 
be killed, and the crop protected from a 
vast horde of them the next year. To 1 
make this control most effective the grass 
along the roadsides and in the fence corn- j 
ers, and other neglected places should be 
carefully cut at the same time. 
GLENN W. HERRICK. 
Conditions in Colorado. 
A FTER an unprecedented snowfall 
that remained till March, and an 
almost continuous spell ©f rain up 
to three weeks ago, that delayed farm- 
work considerably, we have upon us an¬ 
other spell of wet weather, which came 
in the form of hail and a two-inch rain 
following it. Although the rain was ben¬ 
eficial and needed; the icy stones destroy¬ 
ed many gardens in the eastern and 
northern part of Denver and suburbs. 
My own loss was a three-acre strawberry 
patch just ready to make the initial pick¬ 
ing. The moist, frostless Spring was 
ideal for berries (though a little late) 
and the crop that was nearing maturity 
was enormous in quantity and extra large 
and clean up to this time. 
University Park, Colo. G. w. H. 
Pennsylvania Fruit Growers Hold Meeting. 
T HE Summer meeting of the State 
Horticultural Association of Penn¬ 
sylvania was held last week (June 
17 and 18) at State College. This gath¬ 
ering is the first public meeting to be 
held in the newly completed Horticultural 
building at the college. The principal 
features of the meeting were the inspec¬ 
tion of the experimental work being done 
at the college in vegetable, fruit and 
flower growing. One inspection trip in¬ 
cluded discussions of the asparagus work 
being done with varieties and with crowns 
of various sizes. Palmetto is the most 
profitable variety by more -than $100 an 
acre, and large-sized crowns are superior 
to small-sized by about $150 an acre. 
These experiments show that growers 
can profit by choosing Palmetto and 
large-sized crowns. The irrigation sys¬ 
tem was explained and shown to be a 
profitable investment for truckers, straw¬ 
berry growers, and others. It costs about 
$100 an acre to install, but by its use 
sufficient returns may be secured, either 
by succession or companion arrangement 
of crops, to pay for the installation in 
two years, or even one. 
The experimental orchard, where num¬ 
erous soil treatments, such as sod mulch, 
cover crops, clean cultivation, fertilizer 
treatments and various combinations of 
these are being carried on, was prob¬ 
ably the most interesting feature of the 
meeting. These are the most extensive 
experiments of the kind being conducted 
in the whole United States. They are 
planned on a 10-year basis and are now 
in their eighth year, so that results can 
be seen and progress reports made. An 
innovation was the moving picture show 
of chestnut culture by C. K. Sober, the 
most extensive grower in the State. All 
details of the work were shown in action, 
from the young growing trees to the final 
tin-ashing of the matured nuts. Colonel 
Sober has invented a machine for thrash¬ 
ing the burs, which are beaten from the 
trees and gathered by the wagonload for 
this purpose. 
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P 
OTASH 
AYS 
Profit in Wheat 
Wheat is profitable if the yield is good. A good 
yield is insured by using the right fertilizer. 
No crop gives better profits for a small fertilizer expen 
diture provided intelligence is used in buying, and 
fertilizer is used that is suited to the soil. Almost an; 
fertilizer will increase the wheat crop, but why not get th 
one that will give the best profit? This is the kind in whicl 
the phosphate is balanced with 
POTASH 
Insist on 6 to 8 per aent. of Potash in wheat fertilizer. Some oi 
the best growers use 10 per cent. If you have trouble in getting 
such brands buy Potash and add it yourself. We will sell it to 
you in any amount from 1 bag (200 lbs.) up. Write us foi 
prices, naming amount needed, and for free book on “Fall 
Fertilizers. " It will save money for vou. 
GERMAN KALI WORKS, Inc., NEW YORK — 42 BROADWAY 
Chicago— McCormick Block 
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Atlanta— Empire Bldg. 
San Francisco— 25 California Bt. 
