deposited its egg, by the brown dust that lies on the gum which exudes from the puncture. This fly-egesía exitiosa-is accurately described in page 334 of the 6th volume of the American Farmer. Killing the worm soon after it is hatched, is the best preventive, and this is done by bending a piece of stout wire at one end, having a sharp point, and following the traces of the

worm.

The most formidable disease, at present, is the yellows, which, if suffered to pass unnoticed until the tree is entirely tinged with the jaundiced colour, will destroy it in two years, sometimes in one summer. If the tree is not large, and the disease has just commenced, it can be restored to its health and green colour by a bold trimming, rich manuring, and plentiful waterings. This malady is not propagated from tree to tree by the farina of the flowers, as is sometimes conjectured, but arises from a hot, dry soil, and scantiness of nourishment. A moist, well cultivated soil, ploughed mellow, and so as not to touch the roots of the trees, rarely, if ever, engenders the yellows. Great care should be taken not to plant the kernels from those trees that were infected with this disease, as it is communicated to them; and trees from such seed, especially if planted in the same ground whence they grew, will surely become diseased and perish. We have seen whole rows of yearlings in the nurseries destroyed by the yellows.

Exhaustion and indirect debility always succeed the great excitement of an overbearing year. Trees that have borne fruit beyond their strength, assume the same appearance with those that have the disease called the yellows; the same method of cure must be observed. When thus reduced, great pains should be taken with the manure, as none but the most ripe and mellow should be applied; the compost made from the cow-house being always preferred to that of the horse stable, the latter being too stimulating.

It will be perceived by this-and these remarks are the result of long practice and minute observation-that peach trees should be planted in a deep moist soil, well loosened and frequently manured. Buckwheat ploughed in twice during the season before the blossoms form, is sufficient for a light top dressing; and coarse litter, well ploughed in during the fall just before the winter sets in, is all that the tree requires, unless diseased. There cannot be too much stress laid on the impropriety of allowing a tree to bear too much fruit ; exhaustion and disease will too surely be the consequence. Nor should too much fruit be suffered to hang on one limb, as the little delicate vessels, and even the bark, are strained and cracked, so that the injury they receive prevents them from bearing fruit the next year. Four things, therefore, contribute to bring on

1.9

fru

the yellows-overbearing, improper nourishment, want of nourishment, and a hot, dry soil.

Apricots and nectarines are not so frequently diseased by the yellows, and they would yield good crops were it not for the ravages of the curculio, an insect which destroys the fruit. Cherries suffer in the same way by the same insect, scarcely any ripening without one or more worms in each. Birds make no impression on the numbers of these destructive insects; nor is it possible or prudent to let hogs run loose in a young orchard as some persons advise. It is well known that, from the propensity these animals have to turn up the ground, they would materially injure the roots of the trees. They break down the limbs, too, and rub off the bark of the trunk.

Our experience has taught us that cherry trees should be grafted low, and kept low, so that the head may form about four feet from the ground. All the imported trees of this fruit are unable to resist the extremes of heat and cold of our climate. Many are seriously injured in the bark by the action of the sun's rays on the south side in summer, and by the cold easterly winds in winter. Allowing the trees to grow low, enables them to shade themselves; and if a wisp of straw is tied on the easterly side in winter, the bark will be prevented from bursting. When the sap vessels are ruptured in summer, and the bark throws out gum, the knife should be freely used until every particle of the mortified part is cut out. Notwithstanding the reluctance that may be felt in thus disfiguring the tree, whole limbs and branches must be sawed off below the affected part, for like fire-blight in pear trees, it poisons the sound portion of the tree when it comes in contact with it. If the gum does not find its way all around the limb, then the whole limb need not be amputated, but only that portion of the bark and wood whence the gum exudes, but not a single speck of the vitiated portion must be left behind. The wounded parts quickly heal; in fact, no tree heals so rapidly as a cherry tree.

Another advantage in keeping the cherry tree low, is the ease with which fruit can be gathered. A ran on a step ladder can pick all the cherries from the tree without snapping or cracking the limbs, or bruising the bark, or breaking off the fruit spurs that are to bear fruit the next year. It is not generally known that the fruit buds for the next year are all formed this summer, in July and August, just as the fruit is ripening. If this were fully known and duly appreciated, horticulturists would be more careful in their choice of persons to pick fruit. All exotic cherries thrive well in our climate, and they would be a source of great profit to the orchardist, were it not that the same insect which injures other fruit deposites an egg in the cherry likewise.

Plums are very extensively cultivated, and it more frequently happens that fine varieties spring up from the kernels or seed of good plums, than from those of other fruit. Several years ago, the plum trees were very materially injured by the multiplied larvæ of insects, which caused a great number of black, knotty warts to form on the limbs, and soon spread all over the tree. All the morello cherries and plum trees were destroyed by the ravages of this insect. A check is now given to the evil by cutting out this black wart as soon as it appears, so that we might reasonably hope for a remuneration for our trouble and expense, as plums are generally good bearers, if the same insect which punctures the nectarine, apricot and cherry could be destroyed. We had at one time under our care several orchards of the rarest and finest fruit, all in full bearing; yet out of fifteen hundred apricot, nectarine, plum, cherry, and apple trees, there was not one bushel of fruit, for three successive years, that was perfectly free from worms. Amongst the number were four hundred nectarines, and four hundred plum trees; not one plum or nectarine from all these trees remained on the tree till ripe--every one had a worn in it!

Our markets would be barren of fruit if it were not for the new orchards that are continually springing up, for it is a fact, well known, that a young tree is not so apt to be stung as an old one. This arises from the few insects that have found their way to the new orchards. As they fly from tree to tree, they soon begin their operations, and then all our care and labour are lost.

These insects have held dominion over our fruit trees for centuries, and, for any thing that we can see to the contrary, they are likely to continue their power over them so long as we choose to plant trees. They have increased in frightful numbers, and yet the greatest ignorance and indifference prevail respecting their ravages. Every man owning a fruit tree saw that the fruit dropped from the tree before it was ripe--he saw that apples, quinces, and cherries were knotty, filled with worms, and unfit either to be eaten or preserved--he saw that it was hopeless to get a single nectarine from a tree of great promise, unless it were protected by gauze nets, and yet he never troubled himself, much as he loved fruit, to enquire into the cause of the evil.

We have detected four varieties of the curculio--one of these deposits its egg in the pod of the pea, which egg becomes a fly during the month of March--sooner or later according to circumstances. The second variety feeds upon the leaves of the grape vine, but this insect only appears at intervals. The third curculio, like the second, does not make its appearance

every year; but instead of the leaf it eats the bud of the grape vine before it shoots out into leaf. A very little vigilance will soon exterminate these three species; but it is the fourth variety that requires all our attention, for it is this destructive little insect--not quite so large as a common house fly-that destroys all our fruit.

This formidable enemy is of a greyish black colour, and, unlike the other three, has a long proboscis which originates immediately from the neck. The pincers, or mouth, are at the extremity of the proboscis, and it is at this extremity, likewise, that the feelers take their rise. These feelers can be elevated or depressed at pleasure; and when the insect is at rest they lie curled up with the proboscis, which is bent under the throat, resting on the body. It feeds after the manner of butterflies, drawing the juices of the fruit through the tubes. It begins its ravages in May, as soon as the fruit is formed, and continues to deposit its eggs so long as the fruit remains on the tree. This it does year after year, increasing in numbers as we increase the number of fruit trees; and we can easily understand why whole orchards of fruit are destroyed when we are told that there are three generations of these curculios in one summer!

What, therefore, is to be done? every experiment has been resorted to, every remedy applied; but no impression is made, either to prevent the increase of the insect, or to save the fruit from being stung by it. It is very mortifying to be thus baffled by an insect that is neither poisonous nor difficult of approach. We are persuaded that a remedy must exist somewhere, and we should hope that time would discover it, if those who are most interested would exert themselves.

We have thrown our views of this matter into this form with the hope that our readers, who are of a different class from those who confine their thoughts to the common books of gardening, may be fully impressed with the importance of the subject.

Not one of the modes hitherto recommended has been found serviceable. In orchards of twelve or fifteen years' growth, hogs might be turned in to eat up all the fruit that falls, and thus destroy many of the curculios, but this could only be beneficial in case of there being no other orchard within a mile or two. It is a fact which cannot be too often repeated, that these insects can fly from tree to tree, and they travel from spot to spot till at length they destroy all the fruit. This is one reason why a stone pavement is of no service for more than a year or two; the curculio flies to these trees from neighbouring orchards. Besides, an orchardist who has three or four thou

sand trees to guard, would find it impossible to pave around them all.

Offensive odours or fumigations do not annoy these destructive insects. The fumes of tobacco, sulphur, resin, and other pungent gums and herbs, make no impression on them, neither are they moved by saline or sulphurous waterings or washings. We do not however despair, and we now make an earnest appeal to all lovers of the art of horticulture to make strong efforts to devise a remedy for the evil.

We call it an evil! we might say calamity, for it is extending itself even to the north, where hitherto it seldom made its appearance. Fruit is no longer a luxury; it is a necessary of life. Thousands of persons labouring under fever and debility are almost wholly sustained by it, and the poor have a right to enjoy it, for it is cultivated with very little expense. Our pride, our tastes, and our health, require that we should exterminate these destructive insects.

We here close our remarks, the result of long experience and close observation, hoping that vigorous efforts will be made to destroy the curculio. The horticultural societies of Philadelphia and Boston have offered a premium of two thousand dollars to the one who shall devise a simple, easy, and cheap remedy. This offer is of several years' standing, but no one has yet made an attempt to claim it.

We hope, also, that what we have said of the work of M. De la Quintinye will induce the public to call for it. This author is a man of taste

ments, with shrewdness and Science, possessing liberal senti

sense. Above all, he is

honest and scrupulously exact. He is the father of modern horticulture; without vanity or prejudice; and cares no more for the moon's influence upon vegetation than we are inclined to do ourselves.