When the bugs first make their appearance in the field they can be easily disposed of by hand picking and dropping into a bucket containing about two inches of water with about one-fourth inch of kerosene on top to kill the bugs.  The picking should be done in the morning, as the bugs are apt to fly in the warm part of the day and scatter where already picked.  Two persons can pick over an acre in one and a half hours, and two pickings are usually sufficient for a season, as after the vines begin to run over the ground pretty well the bugs will not be able to hurt them much.  A pair of thin old gloves will help to keep off one’s hands some of the perfume from the bugs.  The sooner the work starts the fewer bugs to pick.  Cleaning up of all old vines in the fall and removing litter in which the mature bugs hide for the winter will permit less eggs to be laid in the spring and there will be fewer bugs to pick as a result.

The Corn Worm.

Last year all my ears of corn were infested with maggot, growing fat thereon.  Can you help me scare them away?

You have to do with the so-called corn worm which is very abundant in this State and one of the greatest pests to corn growing.  It is the same insect which is known as the boll worm of the cotton in the Southern States.  No satisfactory method of controlling this has been found, although a great deal of experimentation has been done.  Nearly everything that could be thought of has been tried without very satisfactory results.  A late planted corn has sometimes been free, for the insect is not in the laying stage then.  If it were not for this insect the canning of corn would be an important industry in this State.

Melon Lice.

I have in about four acres of watermelons, and there seem to be lice and a small gnat or fly, and also some small green bugs and white worms on the under part of the leaves, which seem to be stopping the growth of the vines, making them wilt and die.  They seem to be more in patches, although a few on all the vines.  Can you please tell me what to do for them?

Melon lice are very hard to catch up with after you have let them get a start.  Spraying with oil emulsions, tobacco extracts, soap solutions, etc., will all kill the lice if you get it onto them with a good spray pump and suitable nozzles for reaching the under sides of the leaves.  The gnats you speak of are the winged forms of the lice; the white worms may be eating the lice; the “small green bugs” may be diabroticas.  If you had started in lively as soon as you saw the first lice you could have destroyed them in the places where they started.  Now your chance lies largely in the natural multiplication of ladybirds and the occurrence of hot winds which will burn up the lice.  It is too late probably, to undertake spraying the whole field.

Wire Worms.

Is there any way to destroy or overcome the destructive work of the wireworm, which I find in some spots takes the lion’s share of crops, such as beans, potatoes, onions, etc.?