lht RURAL NEW-YORKER 
1485 
Garden and Farm Notes 
Cleaning Up Curculio in Old Orchard 
I have bought a small farm on which 
are quite a number of fruit trees, apples 
and pears, that are badly infested with 
apple curculio. I would like to plant 
more, but do not care to go to the trouble 
and expense unless I can clean up the old 
orchard. Can you give me any informa¬ 
tion as to the best methods to eradicate 
the pest? F. o, B. 
Holyoke, Mass. 
I take it for granted that the pest re¬ 
ferred to is the plum curculio and not the 
apple curculio. The former insect is the 
familiar curculio that attacks apples, 
pears, plums, cherries and peaches, while 
the latter, the true apple curculio, is a 
rarer insect and not so injurious a pest. 
As is well known, the plum curculio is 
nearly always present in numbers in old 
and neglected orchards, where it finds con¬ 
ditions under which it thrives best. This 
is especially true if the orchard has not 
been pruned and the branches of opposite 
trees have grown to meet each other, so 
that the ground beneath the trees is well 
shaded from the sun. Moreover, if weeds 
and grasses have grown at liberty in the 
orchard, and if a fence, grown up to 
weeds and bushes, has been allowed to re¬ 
main on one or two sides of the orchard, 
the curculio will have been particularly 
well pleased, and will have surely flour¬ 
ished and waxed strong in numbers. 
These are just the conditions favorable 
for the curculio during the Winter. The 
small beetles hide away during the Win¬ 
ter along fence rows and hedge-rows and 
among the debris of weeds and grasses in 
overgrown areas. After the Winter is 
over they come forth in all their Spring 
vigor, and begin attacking the fruit about 
as soon as it is set. 
We recall in this connection the experi¬ 
ence of one of our most progressive fruit 
growers in Western New York. On one 
side of his plum orchard ran an old atone 
wall which had become overgrown with 
weeds, vines and bushes. Here was an 
ideal place in which the curculio passed 
the Winter, and until this waste stone 
fence row was cleaned up the curculio was 
not satisfactorily controlled, despite care¬ 
ful and thorough spraying. 
The first step, then, in the control of 
this insect is to prune the trees rather 
thoroughly and let in the sunlight. It has 
been shown conclusively that direct sun¬ 
light striking the fallen fruit will soon kill 
the grubs within. The next step is to 
mow or at least pasture the orchard close¬ 
ly in order to keep down grass and weeds. 
We believe on the whole it would be bet¬ 
ter to plow and cultivate the orchard and 
keep it entirely clean of grass and weeds 
until the cover crop is sown in late Sum¬ 
mer. Then if the overgrown fence is pres¬ 
ent along one or more sides of the or¬ 
chard it should be thoroughly cleaned up, 
and if possible entirely removed and the 
ground plowed and planted to some crop. 
Finally, the orchard should be thorough¬ 
ly sprayed with arsenate of lead (pastel 
at the rate of 5 lbs. to 100 gals, of water 
once just after the petals fall and again 
about three weeks thereafter. If a par¬ 
ticularly thorough job is desired the first 
year, another application should be made 
during the last week of July or first week 
in August. It is well to say that these 
sprayings are also effective in controlling 
the codling moth, the wors apple pest 
in this country, and one which has to be 
sprayed for every year anyhow. 
There is no doubt but that the curculio 
and codling moth can be held in check and 
satisfactorily controlled if the forgoing 
methods of orchard practice and spraying 
are faithfully carried out. No one need 
hesitate, for fear of the curculio, to plant 
an orchard. glenn w. hebbick. 
Diseased Hollyhocks; Thrips 
1. What can I do for my hollyhocks? 
There are tiny little brown egg-like spots 
on underside of leaf, and soon the whole 
plant looks as if it had had a lire built 
under it and never amounts to much. Is it 
rust or blight, and what is a remedy? 
Of course it is late for treatment this 
year, but would like to be prepared for 
next, as I have some choice seed to try 
out. 2. Another pest is millions of tiny 
white flies (at least they fly) on under¬ 
side of hollyhocks and tomato plants. 
What are they and what is a remedy? 
They were on my house plants in Winter. 
Thought when I got them outdoors would 
be rid of them, but they seemed to in¬ 
crease. Insect powder or sulphur does 
not affect them. MBS. J. P. F. 
Montpelier, Yt. 
1. There are several serious fungous 
diseases affecting hollyhocks. Your de¬ 
scription may apply to either rust or 
blight. Itust appears in the form of 
yellow or brown spots, raised above the 
surface of the leaf, like a wart. In bad 
cases the whole plant may wither and 
die. It is recommended to make a satu¬ 
rated solution of permanganate of potash, 
dilute two tablespoonfuls with one quart 
of water, and sponge the diseased parts 
with this. Rlight is a more serious 
trouble, and is a great hindrance to the 
commercial culture of the hollyhock. It 
occurs on any green part of the plant, 
forming brown spots and causing wither¬ 
ing. When on soft young stems, collapse 
of the parts beyond follows; on older 
■ growth sunken spots varying from yellow 
■to black are produced. The only control 
measure suggested is to spray with Bor¬ 
deaux as soon as the leaves appear, and 
every second day thereafter. Where stock 
is badly affected it is practically impos¬ 
sible to grow hollyhocks. 
2. The “tiny white fly’’ is probably 
thrips, a small yellowish-white insect 
with transparent wings, quite active in 
movement, that is often a serious pest on 
roses and other garden plants; there is 
also a greenhouse form. Treatment must 
be applied to the under side of the leaves. 
Tobacco extract or whale olil soap solution, 
thoroughly applied, controls this insect. 
Garden Notes 
I think I have established a record 
this Summer for sweet corn growing, not 
a short-time one exactly, but one that 
can be followed out with good results. I 
planted Golden Bantam corn on May 0, 
again on June 11, and a third time on 
July 2. All plantings grew well, and I 
gathered corn for the table from the first 
planting in SS days from the day of 
planting, from the second in S5 days' and 
from the third in 80 days. This last 
date was September 20. which is about 
the latest that can be depended upon in 
Western New York. Frosts sometimes 
come earlier than that. I think the 
Bantam corn is the most reliable of any, 
for it comes up promptly and it takes a 
big setback to stop its growth. It is 
strong rooted, so that it will grow in 
very light soil, in dry weather, which is 
not the case with shallow-rooted vegeta¬ 
bles, such as cucumbers, potatoes and 
Summer onions, all of which failed me 
on the same plot this season. 
Next time I plant sweet corn I shall 
leave intervals of not. more than two 
weeks. I have now discovered that the 
Bantam can be relied upon for pretty 
uniform growth whenever planted, and 
it is good not more than two weeks after 
it begins to be large enough to cat. It 
may be said that I might have made an 
earlier planting than on May 0, but I 
could not have done so this season, which 
was late. I had a few spears of Bantam 
corn in the ground which I had set 
out from a flower pot, where I had 
planted it to see if it would grow readily. 
It had refused to make any further 
growth till the very day when the first 
planting was made. Bantam corn suc¬ 
ceeds perhaps best when planted in drills 
five inches apart. A good ear can be 
raised on single rows every five inches 
in that way. john w. ohambeblin. 
Chipmunks Eat Peas 
On page 1200 Mr. Ormsbee writes that 
chipmunks do not eat peas. Mr. Ormsbee 
is very much mistaken. Chipmunks do 
eat them, and before eating them they 
peel them. I had Nott’s Excelsior, Gradus 
and Black Marrowfat, the latter two 
grown on brush, where the chipmunks sat 
peeling the tall ones. Of Nott’s Excelsior 
they take only the peas that ripen late. 
Port Jefferson, N. Y. o. K. 
I am very glad to hear it. However, 
I must assume that either the garden 
peas of New York have a better flavor 
than those grown in Vermont, or that the 
New York chipmunks are less particular 
about their food than the Vermont species. 
I once kept a pair of chipmunks for sev¬ 
eral months, in captivity, and they posi¬ 
tively refused to eat either peas or beans, 
either green or dried, though they never 
seemed to learn that they were not pal¬ 
atable until they tasted of one. I used 
to like to drop a few peas into the cage 
occasionally. Each chipmunk would seize 
one, sit erect upon its haunches, hold the 
pea in its front paws and begin to nibble 
at it. Then it was amusing to see the 
little fellows make a wry face, throw the 
pea to one side, come to me, and, in mute 
language, beg for food more to their lik¬ 
ing. It was upon this that I based my 
statement. 
The chipmunks arc cunning little fel¬ 
lows. well worthy of observation, and it 
would be interesting if we could have 
more notes and comments upon their 
habits. For instance, how do they man¬ 
age to excavate their burrows, sometimes 
to a depth of three feet, and a horizontal 
distance of 20 feet, with a compartment 
at the extremity easily capable of hold¬ 
ing a bushel of grain, and still leave no 
earth at the entrance? Assuming, as is 
probably the case, that the earth is car¬ 
ried away in its pouches, will someone 
measure the capacity of the pouches and 
give us an estimate of the number of 
trips that a chipmunk must make in order 
to excavate its burrow? And all the little 
fellow gets for its labor is just its board 
and lodging. c. o. obmsbee. 
Canna Fiery Cross in California 
In his “Notes from a Maryland Gar¬ 
den ’ I'rof. Massey says the new Ganna 
Fiery Gross is a disappointment to him 
on account of hanging its head over. Not 
so with me: here in Oalifornia it holds 
its head erect as any Ganna 1 ever tried 
out. and with its large brilliant flowers 
makes a grand showing. f. L. 
Amador Co., Oal. 
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