A VALUABLE DISCOVERY.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXXIII, Issue 10080, 16 March 1896, Page 3

A VALUABLE DISCOVERY.

A CERTAIN REMEDY FOR CODLIN MOTH. Our Pukekohe East correspondent reports that Mr. Martin Gubb, Government Pomologist, called upon him on Friday morning last, and gave him a few particulars worth publishing. Commencing in January, Mr. Gubb has been engaged by the New Zealand Agricultural Department in travelling with a Zimmerman fruit-drier, instructing orchardists in the art of drying apples, etc. He has already viated the Thames, Tauranga, Raglan, and other places. He was on his way to Waiuku, where he would remain for a few days, visiting other localities in due course. At the Franklin Agricultural Show, which comes off on Saturday next, Mr. Gubb is to be on the grounds with his Zimmerman, when parties interested will have an opportunity of seeing how apples are manipulated and dried. In all the districts visited Mr.Gubb found orchards more or less infested with the codliu grub. At Raglan, however, he came , across an orchard that, with the exception of a i Dingle tree, was free from the grub, and also free from the woolly aphis. The owner, it 1 appears, has discovered some method of treating trees that they are proof against both the codlin moth and the American blight, and his trees are a practical demonstration of the success ot the treatment. The tree alluded to, upon which Mr. Gubb found apples infested with grub, had not been treated, which accounted for the fact of grubs being present. Now if, on further trial, the treatment, whatever it may be, is found thoroughly reliable, it ought to be of untold value, not only to growers of _ apples but to the colony at large. The codlin moth pest is especially rampant in the Auckland province, and if a simple inexpensive remedy has been discovered, it will certainly be a desideratum. In addition to the trees in question being free from the grub and the woolly aphis, they are also in a vigorous and healthy condition. Our own correspondent at Waitetuna writes:—Mr. Armstrong's orchard is becoming quite an interesting feature in Waikato horticulture. He has already taken out a patent for the discovery, which is a most valuable one. It will not only insure immunity from the attacks of the codlin moth, but is a specific for the American blight or woolly aphis, and Mr. Armstrong believes will be found a preventive of that fell disease in the grape vine, phylloxera. He has been experimenting for years on these plants, and only within the last two years has he succeeded in accomplishing his object. He dressed his orchard with the remedy about July, which lie states is of a simple nature and non-poisouous, for an apple might be dipped into it and eaten without producing any ill effects. It is easy of application, either by spraying, or swabbing the trunk and branches of the tree with the mixture, though Mr. Armstrong tells me it will lie sufficient if the trunk of the tree only is coated with it. The cost will be not more than rom £1 to £ 15s per acre of a hundred trees, from one penny per tree, according to size. The time to treat the trees is in July when the sap is rising.