FRUIT GROWING The man who has one or two apple
trees in his garden may fuss about them or, as is more often the case, leave them to do their best without nursing; but how different things are for the man with a commercial interest, who dares not waste his labour and cannot afford to neglect his trees! He must watch for his enemies, whether birds or insects. He must shoot the bullfinch, rig starers in the shape of muslin, tinsel or cotton, and spray for things like codlin moth and red spider. The green aphides are a great source of worry in their turn. A friend who has a large commercial orchard and fruit farm wrote to me the other day to say that his work and costs were considerably increased because of an east wind which kept the fruit blossom from opening long enough to allow a spray to reach the aphides, with the result that he was having to follow an early tar-oil spray and a subsequent BHC spray with a nicotine treatment. There is no insurance against a wind, a bad summer or the fertility of parasites.
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