WIRE WORM AND CLICK BEETLE. 
49 
Wireworms do much harm, and weakness and slackness of bine, which 
is often produced by their attacks, is attributed to other causes, such 
as the unsuitableness of the subsoil, or the want of manure, or 
influences of climate. 
When the presence of Wireworms is discovered in the plant 
centres they can only be got rid of by catching them; they are 
beyond the reach of caustic applications, and of the effects of rolling 
and nidgetting. In these circumstances traps should be laid for them 
in the shape of small pieces of rape-cake, mangel-wurzel, turnip, or 
carrot, placed close to each “ hill ” or plant centre, but the best of all 
these is the rape-cake. The Wireworms soon discover these tempting 
baits, and speedily bury themselves in them, and women are employed 
to look at them twice or three times a week, and take out the Wire- 
worms snugly ensconced therein. As many as 200 Wireworms have 
been taken in this way from one plant centre in the course of three 
weeks or a month. It is a fallacy to imagine that rape-cake directly 
causes the death of the Wireworms by inducing them to gorge until 
they burst. Rape-cake acts, as has been shown above, as a capital 
trap by which they may be caught, and got rid of; or when it is 
applied broadcast to Hops or Corn by taking their attention from the 
plants which they had attacked before the rape was applied. 
I saw a striking instance of this last spring in the case of a field of 
Oats taken after Wheat, in which the plants were looking thin, 
patchy, and sickly from the attack of Wireworm; 6 cwt. of rape-dust 
were put on per acre, which diverted the insects from the plants, and 
at the same time stimulated their flagging energies. The crop was 
the stoutest I ever saw, and yielded close upon eleven quarters per 
acre. If the straw had not gone down in places after the deluge of 
rain the yield would have been greater. 
Rape-cake is very largely and generally used as a fertilizer for 
Hops, and there is no doubt Wireworms are encouraged to a certain 
extent by its extensive employment in Hop land, but it is certain that 
they will not prey upon the Hop plants so long as rape-cake is obtain¬ 
able. I have tried to oust Wireworms from Hop plants by putting 
nitrate of soda, and lime, and soot close round the hills, but the results 
were not satisfactory. To prevent Wireworm attack the Hop land 
should be kept very clean, and the weeds and grass growing on the 
outsides and hedgerows carefully kept down.—(Charles Whitehead, 
Barming House, Maidstone.) 
Handpicking. 
Where Wireworms are unusually numerous upon Turnips there 
cannot be a more effective or cheaper method of dealing with them 
than that of picking them by hand. 
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