FIGHTING THE CHINCH-BUG

KEROSENE EMULSION.

BY MEANS OF

(Goff.)

Experiments have established the fact that with thorough work according to the directions given below the kerosene emulsion will prevent the invasion of cornfields by chinchbugs, even though the bugs appear in great numbers.

How to Make and Apply the Kerosene Emulsion.-Slice half a pound of common bar soap, put it in a kettle with one gallon of soft water, and boil until dissolved; put two gallons of kerosene in a churn or stone jar, and to it add the boilinghot soap solution; churn from twenty to thirty minutes, when the whole will appear creamy. If properly made, no oil will separate out when a few drops of the emulsion are placed on a piece of glass. To each gallon of the emulsion add eight galions of water and stir. Apply with a sprinkling-pot.

Every farmer should learn to make this emulsion, as it is a most useful insecticide. It is especially valuable for killing lice on cattle and hogs. Paris green will not kill chinchbugs.

The bugs will be very likely to enter cornfields bordering grainfields, after the grain is cut. Before they have had time to do this plough a deep furrow along the side of the field they will enter, and throw into it stalks of green corn. When the bugs have accumulated on the corn, sprinkle with the emulsion. Put in fresh stalks and sprinkle whenever the bugs accumulate. If they break over the barrier, as they probably will, run a few furrows a few rows back in the field, and repeat. When they have attacked stalks of standing corn, destroy by sprinkling.

If the remedy is tried, it should be used persistently. To kill one lot of bugs and then stop will do little or no good. When the bugs threaten to destroy as much as five or ten acres, it will pay for one or two men to devote their whole time to the warfare. Only a part of each day, however, will be needed. Some corn will be lost at best, but the most of the field should be saved.

A CHEAP ORCHARD-SPRAYING OUTFIT.

(U. S. Dept. of Agriculture.)

Spraying to control various insect pests, particularly those of the orchard and garden, has reached so satisfactory and inexpensive a basis that it is recognized by every progressive farmer as a necessary feature of the year's operations, and in the case of the apple, pear, and plum crops the omission of such treatment means serious loss. The consequent demand for spraying apparatus has been met by all the leading pump manufacturers of this country, and ready-fitted apparatus, consisting of

pump, spray tank or barrel, and nozzle with hose, are on the market in numerous styles and at prices ranging from

Orchard-spraying Apparatus.

$20 upward. The cost of a spraying outfit for orchard work may, however, be considerably reduced by purchasing merely the pump and fixtures, and mounting them at home on a strong barrel. An apparatus of this sort, representing a style that has proven very satisfactory in practical experience, is illustrated in the accompanying figure. It is merely a strong pump with an air-chamber to give a steady stream, provided with two discharge hose-pipes. One of these enters the barrel and keeps the water agitated and the poison thoroughly intermixed, and the other and longer one is the spraying hose and terminates in the nozzle. The spraying-hose should be about 20 feet long, and may be fastened to a light pole, preferably of bamboo, to assist in

directing the spray. The nozzle should be capable of breaking the water up into a fine mist spray, so as to wet the plant completely with the least possible expenditure of liquid. The two more satisfactory nozzles are those of the Nivor and the Vermorel type. A suitable pump with nozzle and hose may be obtained of any pump manufacturer or hardware dealer at a cost of from $13 to $15. If one with brass fittings be secured it will also serve for the application of fungicides. The outfit outlined above may be mounted on a cart or wagon, the additional elevation secured in this way facilitating the spraying of trees, or for more extended operations, the pump may be mounted on a large water tank.

IX. FORESTRY.

FORESTRY FOR FARMERS.

By B. E. FERNOW, Chief Division of Forestry, U. S. Department of Agriculture.

There has been much talk about forestry, but there has been little application of the teachings of that science. This is easily explained as far as the lumbermen are concerned, who are in the business of making money by cutting the virgin woods, similar to the mining of ore, but it is less intelligible with the farmer, who is presumed to be in the business of making money by the production and harvesting of crops, which he grows on the soil of his farm.

That his wood-lot could and should by him be also treated as a crop seems rarely to have entered his mind. Whether he starts out, as in the prairie portions of the State, by planting a grove, or whether he cuts his wood from the virgin growth which he left after clearing enough for field and meadow, in either case he should fully realize that he is dealing with a valuable crop, which requires and will pay for the attention and application of knowledge in its management, such as a husbandman will give to it.

The Wisconsin farmer, just as his neighbor in Minnesota, living in a State largely covered with timber of great value, has special reason to practise the principles of forestry in order to get the most out of this part of the property both for the present and the future. And those who are located in the prairie portions have no less need of maintaining a forest growth on some part of their farm as a matter of proper management of their resources.

The first thing, as with every other crop, that will have to be decided is on what portions of the farm this wood-crop is best propagated. In deciding about the location of the wood-lot the farmer must keep in mind:

I. That wood will grow on almost any soil, which is unfit for agricultural use; that, although it grows best on the

best sites, it is to be mainly considered and used as a "stopgap" to make useful those parts which would otherwise be waste.

2. That a forest growth, besides furnishing useful material, is a condition of soil-cover which affects other conditions, namely, of climate and water-flow, and hence its location should be such as to secure the most favorable influence on these.

3. That the wood-crop does not live on the soil, but on the air, enriching the soil in nutritive elements by its decaying foliage rather than exhausting it, and hence that no manuring and no rotation of crops is necessary as in field crops; in other words, the location of the wood-crop can be made permanent.

A wood growth should therefore be maintained on the farm :

a. Wherever the ground is too wet or too dry, too thin or too rocky or too steep, for comfortable ploughing and for farm crops to do well, or for pasturage to last long, or, in general, where the ground is unfit for field and meadow.

b. On the highest portions of the farm, the tops of hills and also in belts along the hillsides, so as to interrupt continuous slopes, which might give rise to such a rush of surface-waters as to gully the ground and make it unfit for field crops or pasture; the gentler slopes which are liable to washing should at least be kept in grass or terraced for crops to prevent the rush of surface-waters.

c. Along watercourses, where narrower or wider belts of timber should be maintained to prevent undermining of banks and washing of soil into the streams if ploughed too close to the border; the shade of a forest growth would also check rapid evaporation of smaller watercourses.

d. Wherever the protection by a wind-break against cold or hot winds is desirable, for which purpose the timber belt is of more far-reaching effect than the wind-break of a single row of trees; the reduced evaporation from the fields due to this protection has been known to increase the yield of field crops by as much as 25 per cent.

e. On all unsightly places, which impair the general