Mat 11. 
THE COTTAGE GARDENER. 
ior 
the cause, for they come from the pith of the cane through 
the bud. Then the bud seems to die immediately. I have 
sent you some, and if you could tell me of any application 
that would destroy or check them, I shall be greatly obliged 
to you. I am afraid if they are not cheeked they will soon 
destroy them all. The ground is a light soil with a sandy 
bottom.— Scothoi.m.” 
[The grubs are those of a small Moth called Tinea 
corticella, being so named by Linnaeus, who, from finding it 
in the cracks of the bark (cortex) of the Apple-tree, 
thought its grubs fed there. The Moths are small, being 
about half-an-inch only across their expanded wings. The 
upper wings are glossy brown, varied with gold-coloured 
spots, two large ones of which are on the upper edge of the 
wings, meeting when these are closed ; the under wings are 
dark brown. It appears at the commencement of June, 
and lays its eggs on the canes of the Raspberry; these j 
hatch early in August. The grubs are very small, and feed on 
the leaves until the approach of winter, when they burrow 
into the buds, and continue torpid until the return of spring. | 
They eat their way out about the middle of May, form a 
web among the leaves, and pass into the chrysalis state, and 
emerge in June as Moths, as already stated. The only re¬ 
medies are to seek for the caterpillars in August; but the 
most radical course would be to cut down all the canes, 
young and old, in the autumn, and burn them. The next 
year's crop would be sacrificed, but the pest would be exter- | 
miuated, unless fresh invaders could come from your 
neighbours.] 
POULTRY. 
ULCERS IN DORKING HEN. 
“I have a Dorking hen which is suffering from two lumps, 
one on each side of the beak; and on the tongue is a flat 
yellow spot like matter. The bird picks up its food with 
great difficulty; and the lumps seem very sore.—J. H. C." 
[It is most difficult to prescribe for any disorder unless j 
the symptoms are very fully detailed. From the description 
given it is not possible to know the exact situation of the 
lumps, or what part is affected; nor is it stated whether 
they are hard or soft, inflamed or otherwise. If the 
lumps are soft, and appear full of fluid, open them, and 
then wash them with a little blue vitriol dissolved in water 
(10 grains to the ounce). The sore tongue may be touched 
with the same, and three grains of blue pill given as au 
alterative.] 
A COCK SPELL BOUND. 
S. J. says—“Take a cock of any breed, set him down, hold 
his bill to the floor, draw with a piece of chalk a line from 
his bill straight from him, and he will not move, and cannot 
be frightened from the spot. What is the cause?” 
[We cannot tell, any more than we can tell why a person 
is so unnerved by the mesmerist that he cannot move liis 
hands, or rise from his seat. We know, from unmistakeable 
testimony, that people can be so mesmerized ; and we know, 
from actual experiment, that the Cock can be deprived of 
the power to move by a chalk-line drawn straight from the 
point of his beak.] 
MORTALITY AMONG SPANISH CHICKENS. 
“ Should you have time and space, I shall feel obliged if 
you would state, in The Cottaoe Gaudener, your opinion as 
to the cause of death in my Spanish chickens. They were 
hatched on the 17th of March, and have gone on very well 
until the last week, when, out of a brood of nine, two have 
died yesterday, and three more are pining. They have been 
fed upon oatmeal, crumbs of bread, boiled eggs, small wheat, 
and occasionally potatoes and oatmeal mixed; have been 
allowed to run in a small enclosure of grass, where the large 
fowls could not get among them. They have eaten heartily 
until they died, and their crops were full at the time of 
death, nevertheless they are mere skeletons. Could the 
cold easterly winds have had an injurious effect upon them, 
and have caused death? Last year, with similar treatment, 
and care, I was very successful, and scarcely lost a chicken, 
but this season I fear a totally different result.—Wit. B. 
Selwooh.” 
[We sent your note to the most successful breeder of • 
Spanish fowls, and this is his reply :—“ I see nothing to ob¬ 
ject to Mr. Selwood’s treatment, except, perhaps, the 
Potatoes, which for very yonny Chickens, I do not like. Three 
things may have caused the death of the Spanish chicks, if 
exposed at all to the cold easterly winds, they are likely 
enough to die, as very many have done this year ; but from 
their being skeletons, at the same time that they were 
feeding well, I do not think it was this. He says nothing 
about water, which I hold to be of first rate importance. 
I believe that many a chicken would be saved if more 
attention was paid to water. An old woman, who was very 
successful in rearing all sorts of poultry (especially I 
Turkies), would never give them water from a tin vessel, 
always preferring a rusty iron one, or a lump of rusty iron in 
an earthenware one. This may be an old woman’s story, 
but is so easily done that I at once used it, and, I think, 
successfully. Let the chickens be examined. It is not im¬ 
possible they may be infected with lice —not an uncommon 
thing ! chickens will then pine and die. Snuff will cure this, 
blown under their feathers, but must be used carefully. I 
prefer taking the very finest possible sand, bake it in an 
oven, put it in the chickens’way when pleasantly warm; the 
warmth will induce them to use it, and so get rid of their 
tormentors. I huve known a puppy (a Skye) pine almost 
away from being infected with vermin.”] 
TOBACCO CULTURE IN NEW YORK. 
Tiie kind of soil best adapted to the growth of this plant 
is a sandy or gravelly one, which must be pretty highly 
manured; but any field, rich enough to grow a good crop of 
corn, will give a fair crop of tobacco. The proper system of 
culture is to plough your land set apart for this crop early 
in the spring. (It should be land that has had some cul¬ 
tivated crop grown on it the year previous, as experience has 
proved it to be better than green sward, and not as liable to 
be infested with worms, which sometimes do much mischief 
in the early stages of its growth.) Plough again about the 
time you are ready to set the plants, and harrow it well. 
The plants should be five or six inches high, grown in a 
bed in the garden, or other warm, rich place—sown as soon 
the frost is out of the ground in the spring. Sow the seed 
on the ground, and spat it down hard with the back of a 
spade, or tread it over with your feet. A bed ten feet square 
is sufficient to i-aise plants for an acre. The time for trans¬ 
planting is from the 10th to the 25th of June. The best 
time to transplant is immediately after a rain. If the ground 
is very dry, it will be necessary to water the plants as you 
set them. 
The ground should be marked in straight rows, three feet 
apart, and slight hills made on these marks two feet six 
inches apart; then set the plants, which should be done 
well, taking care to press the earth firmly aronnd the roots. 
As soon as the plants are started to growing, run the culti¬ 
vator through, and follow with the hoe, resetting where the 
plants are missing. The crop should be hoed at least three 
times at proper intervals, taking care to hoe the ground all 
over. When the tobacco begins to blossom, the tops of the 
plants, and the suckers also, should be broken off, with some 
of the smaller leaves on the top of the plant. The suckers 
should all be broken off at the time of harvesting. 
Harvesting commences the first of September, and ought 
to be finished by the middle of the month, as frost may be 
expected by that time. The stalks must be cut near the 
ground, and left in the sun a short time to wilt the leaves, 
then taken to the drying-shed and hung on poles by means 
of strong twine, at the rate of thirty to forty plants to twelve 
feet of pole. The poles are to be laid across the beams 
about sixteen inches apart. The sheds are built high enough 
to hang three or four tiers, the beams being about four feet 
apart up and down. In this way a building forty feet by 
twenty-two will cure one-and a half acres of tobacco. The 
drying-sheds should be supplied with several doors on either 
side to allow the free circulation of air, in order to facilitate 
the process of curing. 
It will be sufficiently cured in two or three months, when 
as much as is desirable is taken down in damp weather, 
laid in a pile, the bnts of the stalks outward ; the leaves are 
then stripped off and done up in small hanks by winding a 
