Part 3

As some of our readers may feel desirous of examining the egg-clusters of these Tent Caterpillars for themselves, we give an engraving, shewing the cluster as it will now be found, fastened around the twigs of the apple trees. They will be more easily seen in a cloudy day, and will be found near the ends of the shoots, not often more than a foot from the tip, and frequently but an inch or two. The gummy covering will prevent the individual eggs from being seen quite as distinctly as they are shewn in the engraving, it having been removed to shew the regularity of their position. This engraving represents the moth and egg-cluster of the Forest Tent Caterpillar. Fig. _a_ shews a twig with the bracelet of eggs upon it, and _b_ represents the moth with the wings expanded.

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THE AMERICAN ARBOR-VITÆ FOR SHELTER-BELTS.

BY H. IVES, BATAVIA, N. Y.

In the report of the Fruit Growers’ Association, the planting of timber belts as screens and wind-breaks for the protection of orchards was very properly mentioned as an important condition of success in fruit growing. In addition to the trees mentioned for this purpose, I would name the American arbor-vitæ for a low, dense growing and very effectual wind-break. It is very hardy, and can be obtained in almost any locality, it being found in all the Northern portion of the continent as far South as Pennsylvania. I approve of President Burnet’s advice to plant the trees intended to form the timber belt in triple rows, but in the row of maple, or other deciduous trees, would plant an arbor-vitæ between every two deciduous trees, so as to fill the space between the trunks of the trees from the ground to where the branches commence. In this way a dense, low growth will be secured which will preserve a complete wind-break near the ground, when the other trees have lost their lower limbs and the larches have been taken for timber.

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SOME FRUITS OF RECENT INTRODUCTION.

The second part of the Transactions of the Massachusetts Horticultural Society has been received, through the politeness of Robert Manning, Esq., Secretary, from which we glean some very interesting information concerning several of the fruits that have recently been brought to the attention of cultivators. It is hardly necessary to state that the officers of that Society are gentlemen who are well informed on the subject of fruits of all kinds, and that the opinions expressed by them with regard to their excellencies or faults are entitled to the highest consideration.

At the strawberry show, which was held in the city of Boston, on the 27th of June, 1877, the first prize for the best four quarts of any variety was awarded to the Belle; the same variety took also the second prize, and likewise the first prize for the best fifty berries. This is one of the seedling strawberries raised by Mr. John B. Moore, who seems to have been more than usually successful in this field of experiment; inasmuch as three of his seedling strawberries are mentioned in these transactions, the General Sherman, Hervey Davis, and Belle. The Belle is stated to be the largest of his seedlings, indeed the largest strawberry ever exhibited before the society, and the quality good. The General Sherman is spoken of as an early fruit, very large and handsome, and of “good” quality. The Hervey Davis is considered by Mr. Moore to be the most valuable seedling he has raised, it being very hardy, prolific, and early; fruit very large, quality very good to “best.” The fruit committee considered either of these seedlings to be in all respects superior to the Monarch of the West, or the Great American.

In our experience with new varieties of the strawberry, we have very often found that change of soil and climate make a great change also in the size and quality of the fruit, and the productiveness of the plant. There is not another variety in cultivation that has so universally accommodated itself to all soils and all climates as the Wilson. Many varieties have risen into a short-lived notoriety, a few yet remain that are generally cultivated in order to give variety and extent to the strawberry season, but we are fully persuaded that there are yet thousands of quarts of the Wilson grown and consumed, to every hundred quarts of any other sort. Time will tell whether these seedlings of Mr. Moore’s raising, or any of them, will be able to rank in general usefulness equal to or above those we now have; meanwhile we hope that some of the members our Association will procure them, and give their opinion of the value they are likely to possess for us.

In peaches, we notice that the Foster has become exceedingly popular about Boston, for not only did it receive the prize for the best single dish, but that more of this variety was exhibited than of any other. It is a large, yellow fleshed peach, much resembling the Early Crawford, rich and juicy.

The variety of pear which attracted the most attention was the Souvenir du Congres; the specimens exhibited averaged a little over a pound each in weight, and the largest one measured seven inches in length. The fruit committee state that this new pear ranks in quality as “very good.” It originated with M. Morel, of Lyon-Vaise, France. The writer has found the tree to be a vigorous, healthy grower, but it has not yet fruited. He has however seen the fruit on exhibition, and noticed that it was of large size, having much resemblance in form to the Bartlett, and ripening apparently about the same time, or possibly a little earlier. The color was a very handsome yellow, washed with carmine on the sunny side.

The great sensation in grapes was a seedling raised by Mr. John B. Moore. On the first of September it received the first prize for the best early grape. The committee state that on the fourth of September they visited Mr. Moore’s farm and found several hundred vines of this grape, which is called Moore’s Early, growing in near proximity to the Concord and Hartford Prolific, and that the Moore’s Early was fully ripe, and bearing an abundant crop on all of the vines, while both of the other varieties were yet unripe, and seemed to require two or three weeks yet to bring them to maturity. The soil of the vineyard was a light sandy loam. This grape was first exhibited in 1872, and for the last four years has received each year the first prize for the best early grape. The committee recommended that the prize of sixty dollars be awarded to it for the best seedling grape.

A very good early grape is yet in demand. Most of our earliest grapes are deficient in some respect; the Eumelan is wanting in flavor; Hartford Prolific drops from the bunch; Creveling does not set its fruit well; Massasoit has small bunches, &c. We shall be most happy to receive from any member the result of his trial of Moore’s Early, and to give it a place in these pages for the benefit of all.

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DISEASES OF APPLE TREES.

Inquiry is made by Thomas E. Turnbull, Hall’s Corners, Ontario Co., N. Y., as to the cause of the disease in the young apple trees known as “black fungi,” its description and remedy. It is a matter for congratulation indeed, if there be a disease to which any of our fruit trees are liable, and they have so entirely escaped it as to leave us in ignorance of its existence. The editor is very happy in being able to say that he does not know what that disease is. Young apple trees sometimes become what is termed black hearted, from improper fall pruning, and the equally improper attempt to grow them in undrained soil. If this be the subject of our correspondent’s enquiry, we have given him the cause and cure.

He also asks “the cause of trees casting the bark to the height of eight or ten inches from the ground; under the bark the wood looks dead, and the bark scales off in time. No sign of borers. Two trees stand in a garden and are well cultivated, another outside of the garden in sod. The trees are of the Spitzenburg variety, and twenty years old.” “Also on other trees of the same variety the bark dies in streaks on the body and limbs. Is it caused by borers?”

The reason why the bark scales off, is because the wood beneath _is dead_, but why the wood has died is a question not easily answered by one who is ignorant of all the peculiar conditions in which these trees are placed, save the information given in this inquiry. Also it is impossible, for the same reason, to say what is the cause of the death of the bark in streaks on the bodies and limbs of the other trees. Our correspondent should be able to ascertain by examination whether it is probably caused by borers.

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THE CHINESE PRIMROSE.

In a previous number mention was made of this pretty flower, and of the satisfaction it gave to every one who had tried to grow it. We are now able, through the kindness of Mr. James Vick, of Rochester, N. Y., to present our readers with a neat illustration which will enable those not already acquainted with it, to form a very accurate conception of the appearance of the plant and flower.

It is one of those free, bright, cheery looking things, with something of a saucy air about it, that is ever reminding you of wildwood haunts and shady banks, where the fresh breezes toss the leaves, and toy with the flowers; and while you are enjoying their freshness and beauty, there steals into your mind the long forgotten melody of those witching words:

“I know a bank where the wild thime blows, Where ox-lips, and the nodding violet grows.”

Such is their naturalness and air of vivacity that one never tires of them. You enjoy them to-day, and to-morrow they greet you with such a look of welcome, and hold up their pretty faces to you with such a winning grace that you linger longer than yesterday. You cannot tell which to admire the most, the modest bashfulness of that double white which peeps out to you from under the leaves, or the challenging boldness of that single pink, whose laughing eye meets your gaze so roguishly. Double or single, white, pink, magenta or carnation, they have each their beauty, both of flower and leaf.

You can either purchase the plants at the florists, already in bloom; or, if you enjoy the pleasure of raising them yourself, you can procure the seed from your seedsman. If you undertake to grow them from seed, it will be necessary to provide some light fibrous loam, well mixed with fine sand. Fill a small flower pot nearly half full of potsherds broken quite small, place over these a thin layer of moss to keep the soil from choking the drainage, and finish with your mixture of loam and sand. Now immerse your pot to the rim in water, until the moisture appears at the surface, then let the surplus water drain out, and sow the seed thinly over the surface of the soil. Now sift a very little of the very finest sand over the seeds, or what is better for the beginner, gently press the seed into the soil with some very smooth surface, such as a piece of glass, cover the pot with a light of glass, and set it in the north window of a warm room. In a couple of weeks the young plants will appear, and should be exposed to the light as much as possible, but not to the direct rays of the sun. When they need watering, it is safer to give it by immersing the pot in tepid water, until the soil is sufficiently moistened, than to apply it with a watering pot, unless you have one with a very fine rose. When the plants have become large enough to handle, transplant them separately into thumb-pots, well drained at the bottom, and filled with the same sort of soil that you used before, place them in a window where the sun will not strike them, give them plenty of air, and do not allow the temperature of the room to rise above sixty-five degrees. As fast as the roots fill the pots, shift into other pots a little larger in size, and do not check their growth by neglect. During the summer plunge them into a frame on the north side of some building, and when the nights begin to get chilly in the early part of September, return them to the window where you wish them to bloom. As soon as the flower buds form, be careful not to wet them when watering, lest they should rot.

If your seed was sown early, say in February, and your plants have grown well, they will begin to bloom before Christmas, and continue to yield a succession of flowers until June. When they have done blooming give them a rest of about six weeks, then pot them off into larger pots with fresh soil, and keep them growing, shifting to larger sizes as fast as they fill the pots with roots, if you wish to produce large, showy plants. If you do not wish to have large plants you can cut off the shoots and use them as cuttings, if you prefer this course, for any reason, to raising a fresh lot from seed.

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JARED P. KIRKLAND, L.L.D.

This distinguished man of science died at his home, near Cleveland, Ohio, on the 11th of December, 1877, at the advanced age of eighty-four years. To those who are now passing the meridian of life, he was well known as a most earnest student of nature, working diligently in several fields, with the fidelity and pains-taking of an enthusiastic admirer. His labors in the cultivation of fruits, and especially his experiments in the hybridization of cherries, have made his name familiar to every fruit grower. It is to him that we are indebted for that beautiful early cherry, the Governor Wood, which has been extensively disseminated throughout the sweet-cherry region of Ontario. Over twenty varieties of sweet-cherries, originated by him, are now in cultivation, conspicuous among which, besides the one already named, are his Black Hawk, Kirkland’s Mary, and Rockport Bigarreau.

Dr. Kirkland was born at Wallingford, in the State of Connecticut, on the 10th of November, 1793. His love of nature manifested itself in his early boyhood; the habits of all living things that had their haunts near his childhood’s home were familiar to him, and at the early age of twelve years he was trying experiments in the raising of silkworms. His grandfather bequeathed to him his medical library, and sufficient means to enable him to obtain a medical education. He entered the medical department of Yale College at its opening, and was the first student on its matriculation roll. After pursuing the practice of his profession for several years in his native State, he accepted the chair of theory and practice of medicine in the Ohio Medical College, at Cincinnati, which he filled for five years with great ability and acceptance. In 1837 he purchased a farm, situate five miles west of Cleveland, where he made his home for the rest of his life. Here he pursued his favourite experiments in fruit culture and hybridization, and here he raised those hybrid cherries that have added so much to the pleasure and comfort of many a lover of fruit. During the period of his residence here he superintended the natural history department of the first geological survey of Ohio, and prepared a series of reports, which have been esteemed most valuable contributions to natural history. His large collection of specimens he donated to the Cleveland Society of Natural Sciences, where they are now jealously treasured. His was a busy life, down to its very close; for his temperate habits and genial spirits had preserved his vigor even to old age. May his mantle fall upon some of our young men who shall, with like tireless energy, take up the work of scientific fruit culture, and carry it on to yet fuller and richer results.

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BEETS FOR TABLE USE.

The Turnip-rooted Beets are usually grown for summer use, because they mature early. For many years the variety known as the Early Blood Turnip-Beet has been held in high estimation, both on account of its rich color, and good flavor. Then came the Early Bassano, not so dark in color, yet presenting a beautiful alternation of white and rose when cut into slices, and maturing a little earlier than the Blood Turnip-Beet. Within a few years a variety known as the Egyptian Blood Turnip-Beet has been gaining a place in our gardens. It is rich in color, tender and sweet, and comes to maturity the earliest of them all. On this account it is a favorite with market-gardeners, who often find it to their advantage to be able to supply their customers early in the season.

Beets delight in a rich and mellow soil. In cold and damp soils they are apt to be coarse and of poor flavor. The seed may be sown as early in the season as the ground can be worked. It should be planted in drills, eighteen inches apart, and two inches apart in the drill, and at a depth of an inch and a half. The seed will germinate more certainly and quickly if it be first soaked for a few hours in warm water, just before planting. When the young plants have grown to a height of about three inches they will require to be thinned out so as to stand from four to five inches apart. The young Beets that are pulled up in thinning out make most excellent greens, cooked tops and all. By taking out only a part at a time, the table can be supplied with these greens for some days.

In growing beets for table use it is not wise to endeavor to have them as large as it is possible to grow them. Overgrown beets are usually coarse, and lacking in flavor. A good beet is close and compact, fine grained, free from fibre, and smooth. For winter use the writer is in the habit of making a second sowing of the Early Blood Turnip-Beet about the end of June; these will keep sweet and good until June, if stored in a cold cellar—if kept in a warm cellar they lose their freshness and flavor.

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SHALL WE GRAFT OVER OLD ORCHARDS.

BY H. IVES, BATAVIA, N. Y.

After considerable experience in grafting old orchards on different farms, I have come to the decided conviction that it is better to plant out young, grafted trees of the sorts desired, than to graft over an orchard of old trees. I wished to change an orchard of Northern Spy, which had just begun to bear, into Baldwins; and thinking that the grafting of these thrifty young trees could be done to as good advantage as it ever could in any case, I put in from four to six grafts into each tree, which cost me about the same as new trees. Now I am not at all pleased with my work. The symmetry and beauty of the tree-top is destroyed, and after the best has been done that can be done to develop well-balanced tops from these grafts, they will have the appearance of having been bungled. In the case of old trees it is worse yet; it is more expensive, because more grafts must be set, more trimming done, and the work performed at great disadvantage. It is not, in my opinion, profitable to make such an orchard as satisfactory in appearance or as profitable in the end, as an orchard newly planted with young trees. The old trees will pay for the new trees if dug up by the roots in early Spring and cut up into stove-wood. I had a large orchard of old apple trees which I had dug up for twelve and a half cents each, and produced nearly an average of a cord of wood to a tree. The wood was worth enough, and more than enough, to pay for my new orchard of young trees, and when grown they will be far better than I could possibly have made the old trees by grafting them over.

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ONE OF OUR COMMON INSECTS.

BY W. SAUNDERS, LONDON, ONT.

——— (_Continued from page 11, No. 1._)

When the little caterpillar of the Cecropia Moth has eaten its way out of the egg, and makes its first meal on the empty egg-shell, it presents itself to us as a little, slim, black creature, with shining black knobs on its body, from which arise hairs of the same color. Being blessed with an excellent appetite, its growth is very rapid; and soon its skin becomes uncomfortably tight, when it is ruptured, and after much labor the little thing wriggles itself out of it; which process is repeated several times before the caterpillar attains its full growth. After each of these changes, or moultings, as they are called, the larvæ appears in an altered as well as an enlarged garment, and finally, when full grown, it attains the size and assumes the appearance presented in Fig. 3, and a very handsome creature it is. Its body is of a pale green color, and is ornamented with large warts or tubercles; these are coral red on the third and fourth rings of the body, while all the others are yellow, excepting those on the second and terminal segments, and the smaller tubercles along the sides, which are blue.

During its rapid and enormous growth it consumes an immense amount of vegetable food, and especially as it approaches maturity is its voracious appetite apparent. Where one or two have been placed on a young apple tree, they will often strip it entirely bare before they have done with it, and greatly damage the tree, and sometimes endanger its life by preventing the proper ripening of the wood.

The natural ratio of increase of this insect being very great, nature has provided means to curtail it. Being a somewhat conspicuous object, the larvæ sometimes serve as a dainty meal for some of the larger insectivorous birds, but is much oftener attacked and destroyed by parasites of several distinct species, all of which, in the larvæ state, live within the body of the caterpillar, and rioting on its substance finally occasion its death. One of these is shown in Fig. 4, a fat, legless grub or maggot, which is the progeny of a handsome four-winged fly, of a yellowish brown color, known as the long-tailed ophion fly, (_Ophion Macrurum_,) Fig. 5. The female fly deposits her eggs on the skin of her victim, fastening them firmly there; these, when hatched, eat their way through the exterior, and at once begin to feed upon the fatty parts within.

A two winged fly, known as a Tachina fly, very similar if not identical with the species known as the red-tailed Tachina fly, _Exorista Militaris_, figure 6, is often found infesting the Cecropia Caterpillar. The larvæ of this fly are of a translucent yellow color, and when mature, eat their way out of their victim and change to the chrysalis state under the ground. There are also two smaller species of parasites, known as Chalcis flies, which are destructive to this insect; one of these, (_Chalcis Maria_,) is shown in Fig. 7, much enlarged, the cross lines at the side showing the natural size.

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MILDEW ON THE BLACK CURRANT.

BY REV. W. STEWART DARLING, TORONTO.