Home Vegetable Gardening / A Complete and Practical Guide to the Planting and Care of All Vegetables, Fruits and Berries Worth Growing for Home Use - F. F. Rockwell

However, that the home gardener may be prepared to meet any contingency, I shall take up in brief detail the plant enemies mentioned and the remedies suggested.

Aphis:—The small, soft green plant-lice. They seldom attack healthy growing plants in the field, but are hard to keep off under glass. If once established it will take several applications to get rid of them. Use kerosene or soap emulsion, or tobacco dust. There are also several trade-marked preparations that are good. Aphine, which may be had of any seed house, has proved very effective in my own work, and it is the pleasantest to use that I have so far found.

Asparagus-beetle:—This pest will give little trouble on cleanly cultivated patches. Thorough work with arsenate of lead (1 to 25) will take care of it.

Black-rot:—This affects the cabbage group, preventing heading, by falling of the leaves. In clean, thoroughly limed soil, with proper rotations, it is not likely to appear. The seed may be soaked, in cases where the disease has appeared previously, for fifteen minutes in a pint of water in which one of the corrosive sublimate tablets which are sold at drug stores is dissolved.

Borers:—This borer is a flattish, white grub, which penetrates the main stem of squash or other vines near the ground and seems to sap the strength of the plant, even when the vines have attained a length of ten feet or more. His presence is first made evident by the wilting of the leaves during the noonday heat. Coal ashes mixed with the manure in the hill, is claimed to be a preventative. Another is to plant some early squash between the hills prepared for the winter crop, and not to plant the latter until as late as possible. The early squash vines, which act as a trap, are pulled and burned.

Last season almost half the vines in one of my pieces were attacked after many of the squashes were large enough to eat. With a little practice I was able to locate the borer's exact position, shown by a spot in the stalk where the flesh was soft, and of a slightly different color. With a thin, sharp knife-blade the vines were carefully slit lengthwise on this spot, the borer extracted and killed and the vines in almost every instance speedily recovered. Another method is to root the vines by heaping moist earth over several of the leaf joints, when the vines have attained sufficient length.

Cabbage-caterpillar:—This small green worm, which hatches upon the leaves and in the forming heads of cabbage and other vegetables of the cabbage group, comes from the eggs laid by the common white or yellow butterfly of early spring. Pick off all that are visible, and spray with kerosene emulsion if the heads have not begun to form. If they have, use hellebore instead. The caterpillar or worm of tomatoes is a large green voracious one. Hand-picking is the only remedy.

Club-root:—This is a parasitical disease attacking the cabbage group, especially in ground where these crops succeed each other. Lime both soil and seed-bed—at least the fall before planting, unless using a special agricultural lime. The crop infested is sometimes carried through by giving a special dressing of nitrate of soda, guano or other quick-acting powerful fertilizer, and hilled high with moist earth, thus giving a special stimulation and encouraging the formation of new roots. While this does not in any way cure the disease, it helps the crop to withstand its attack. When planting again be sure to use crop rotation and to set plants not grown in infested soil.

Cucumber-beetle:—This is the small, black-and-yellow-striped beetle which attacks cucumbers and other vines and, as it multiplies rapidly and does a great deal of damage before the results show, they must be attended to immediately upon appearance. The vine should be protected with screens until they crowd the frames, which should be put in place before the beetles put in an appearance. If the beetles are still in evidence when the vines get so large that the screens must be removed, keep sprayed with Bordeaux mixture. Plaster, or fine ashes, sifted on the vines will also keep them off to some extent, by keeping the leaves covered.