484. QUEENSLAND AGRICULTURAL JOURNAL. [1 Dec., 1898. 
Orchard Notes for December, 
By ALBERT H. BENSON. 
Iv the Orchard Notes for November, I called special attention to the 
importance of marketing fruit properly, emphasising the necessity for careful 
handling, even grading, and attractive packing if satisfactory prices are to be 
obtained. Those remarks apply equally to the present month or, in fact, to 
any month of the year, as there is always more or less fruit of one variety or 
another to be marketed; and it is simply wasting time and money cultivating, 
pruning, manuring, or spraying an orchard—in fact, doing everything possible 
to produce good fruit—if when the fruit is grown it is not put on the market 
in such a manner that it will realise the highest price. Careful handling, 
grading, packing, and marketing will secure a ready sale for good fruit in any 
market, even when the same fruit badly handled and unattractively got up 
would be unsaleable. Growers would do well to takea lesson in packing from 
the Californians, who have been shipping apples, or from the Italians, who are 
shipping lemons to this colony, as those fruits, even after a long and trying 
voyage and one or more transhipments, reach here in better condition and in x 
much more attractive state than our local fruit, which is often only carted a 
few miles. 
Keep down pests wherever met with; gather and destroy all fly-infested 
fruit. Destroy orange bugs before they become mature by hand-picking or by 
driving them to the trunks of the trees, by tapping the outer branches with 
light poles, the insects being brushed off from the trunks and main branches 
on to a sheet placed under the tree to catch them, from which they can be 
easily gathered and burnt. 
All caterpillars, cut-worms, beetles, grasshoppers, crickets, or other insects 
destroying the foliage should be destroyed by either spraying the same with 
Paris green, 1 oz. to 10 gallons of water, or by dusting them with a mixture of 
Paris green and air-slacked lime, 1 0z. of Paris green to 5 Ib. of lime. Keep 
the orchard well cultivated, especially in the dry districts ; and where there ig 
water available for irrigation, in such districts all citrus-trees should receive a 
watering during the month unless there is a good fall of rain, when it will be 
of course unnecessary. 
Pineapples, bananas, and other tropical fruit can be planted during the 
month, showery weather and dull days being chosen. The rainy season is the 
best time to transplant most tropical plants. Where it is desirable to go in 
for green crop manuring, or for raising a green crop for mulching, cow-peas 
can be sown, as they will be found to make a very rapid growth now, which 
will be strong enough to keep most weeds in check. 
See that all surface and cut-off drains are in good working order, and not 
choked up with grass, weeds, &c., as heavy rain may fall during the month,. 
and there should be a get-away for all surplus water, which would tend to 
either wash the soil or sour it; stagnant water round the roots of the trees 
being exceedingly injurious at any time, and especially so during the heat of 
summer. 
