We will suppose that you have got your trees growing nicely, and they have begun to bear fruit. There are other important steps to be taken, which will be of little cost to you. Provide a wind-break for the orchard. Evergreens answer the purpose, being a protection against the wind. Having this matter attended to, there are other enemies with which we must contend. I refer to the apple and peach tree borers. The former will live in the tree for three years, if unmolested; the latter, one year only. They are very easily destroyed by looking over the trees and taking them out with a knife; or maybe prevented from touching the trees by wrapping a piece of felt paper, 8 inches wide, around the tree near the ground, the bottom being covered with dirt and the top tied tightly above. The pear is not generally disturbed by these insects--only the apple, peach, and quince. We have another insect very destructive to the plum, peach, cherry, and apple--the curcutio, or plum weavel. This season for the first time in twenty years we have gathered a small crop of that very desirable plum, the Purple Favorite. We simply threw air-slaked lime over the trees nearly every morning for from four to six weeks, from the time the tree was out of bloom. Peach trees should be treated in the same manner. Another method of fighting this insect is to spread a sheet under the tree, and with a blow jar off the little Turk and secure him on the sheet. But I consider the lime procedure the less trouble and more effective. The tent caterpillar, which is easily seen, should be destroyed at once. We have yet another insect to contend with which infests the apple and pear, commonly called the Coddling Moth, and the larva, the apple-worm (Garpocapsa pomonella). The loss by the ravaaes of this insect alone to the fruit growers of the United States fan hardly be estimated, as in many cases the whole crop is rendered worthless. Such a vast destruction of two of the most valuable fruits the world produces should stimulate scientists in this age of progress to discover an effectual remedy against such a gigantic evil.
I have never yet discovered nor tried an effectual remedy against this insect. The nearest I have approached his extermination is in the following manner: After it has entered the fruit and accomplished its damage, the time arrives when it has to leave the fruit and hide itself in a quiet, secure position to undergo the transition from the larva to the pupa state, which requires, in the early part of the season, eight or ten days; after this time the miller is hatched and is again ready to besiege the fruit with its sting. The insect, being two-brooded in this climate at least, if not disturbed, has an aggregating force to do mischief the second time. The progeny for the succeeding year have alone to depend on the security of this second generation of larvæ. As they may often be found in bark of apple trees during winter, my plan of destruction is, about the first of July to take woolen rags long enough to wrap around the trees, and say four inches wide. Each week I look over the trees, and destroy the worms secreted under the rags and wherever I find them until the fruit is off the trees. I have all the green fruit, of every kind, carefully picked up as soon as it falls, thereby destroying many of the curculio as well as the apple-worms.
One word upon the grape--the insect part of the question. The Phylloxera vastatrix, or grape-vine louse, is already at work on Long Island. It is found very difficult to raise many of our fine, new grapes with us in consequence of the depredations of this very minute insect, it being almost too small to be seen by the naked eye. There has lately been discovered a remedy which is entirely chemical and as yet but little disseminated. Very soon, no doubt, a discovery will be made that will stay the progress of this destructive enemy.
We should plant aplenty of cherry and small fruit trees to yield feed for birds. In return they will assist us in our efforts to preserve a bountiful supply of this health producing element.
COARSE FOOD FOR PIGS.
A recent subscriber wants advice how to feed pigs of 25 to 35 pounds weight, that are to be kept over winter and fitted for sale at about six months old--whether coarse food will not help them as much in winter as in summer. How roots and pumpkins will answer in lieu of grass, and what can be fed when this green food is gone? He has had poor success in growing young pigs on corn alone. He has a reasonably warm pen for winter.
The question of food is constantly recurring, and this is one of the best evidences of the advancement of the country in the feeder's art. When people are making no inquiry as to improved methods in any direction, no progress can be made. There has been more progress made in the philosophy of feeding during the last thirty years than in the century and a half previous.
In pig feeding in the dairy districts, young pigs generally grow up in a very healthy condition, owing to the refuse milk of the dairy, which furnishes the principal food of young pigs. Skim-milk contains all the elements for growing the muscles and bones of young pigs. This gave them a good, rangy frame, and, when desired, could be fed into 400 or 500 pounds weight. But the fault attending this feeding was, that it was too scanty to produce such rapid growth as is desired. It took too long to develop them for the best profit. It had not then been discovered by the farmer that it costs less to put the first hundred pounds on the pig than the second, and less for the second than the third, etc.; that it was much cheaper to produce 200 pounds of pork in six months than in nine and twelve months. When it became evident that profit required more rapid feeding, then they began to ply them continually with the most concentrated food--corn meal or clear corn. If this was fed in summer, on pasture, no harm was observed, for the grass gave bulk in the stomach, and the pigs were were healthy and made good progress. But if the young pigs were fed in pen in winter upon corn meal or clear corn, the result was quite different; this concentrated food produced feverish symptoms, and the pigs would lose their appetite for a few days, drinking only water, which, after a while, would relieve the stomach, and the pigs would eat vigorously again. Now, had they been fed a few quarts of turnips, carrots, beets, or pumpkins, to give bulk to the stomach, and separate the concentrated food, no harm would have come. This gives the gastric juice a free circulation through the contents of the stomach, the food is properly digested and applied to the needs of the body instead of causing fever by remaining in the stomach.--Live Stock Journal.