DISCUSSION.

Mr. W. J. Moyle: What will we do with large trees that are badly infested and have become weakened?

Mr. Bues: If you have such trees that have become weakened I would cut them back severely and in addition to that I would spray them with kerosene emulsion. Do not do the cutting without spraying, it would only make them worse. If those trees were badly affected I would cut out the dead wood, the unnecessary wood, the wood that the tree did not need anyway, and then I would spray them during the winter with kerosene emulsion. Otherwise let them go until the first week in May, when the white masses begin to show, when the young commence to hatch, then spray them with water from a hydrant or from a fire plug which will give force.

Mr. Moyle: There is an insect we find on our cottonwood, weeping willows and Carolina poplar. We are planting trees but the insects are eating them right off.

Mr. Bues: It is the imported willow beetle, so-called, and is shipped to this state in nursery stock from New York and Ohio so far as I know. Every case where this insect has been found that has come under my observation I have traced to those two states. New York is badly infested because proper attention was not given the matter, but it should be barred out of this state. We should put it on the blacklist. You can't do anything with it except to dig it out with a knife. My habit has been to go through the nursery and if I find a tree more or less damaged I simply break it right off where the injury exists.

Mr. Geo. J. Kellogg: Does the tree ever recover? Thirty years ago at Janesville we had the cotton louse, but all the trees except a few recovered. What was said about a parasite?

Mr. Bues: Prof. Forbes of the Illinois Experiment Station, wrote a little pamphlet on "Insect Cycles," and he found upon investigation that this cotton maple scale has regular periods of from eight to ten years in which it makes visitations, and the period of visitation usually lasts three or four years, and then for four or five years there is a period of immunity. Just a word in regard to this parasite. The point in question is this, if this parasite breeds only on this particular plant it will soon cut off its own food supply on the plant and the parasite will

die out, and then it takes a number of years to bring it back again. The opinion has been that the parasite will kill out the scale in a few years, but that is not true. Upon that basis people who leave it to the parasite would have the condition that confronts us now. I think as I look at it that there is a certain relationship between the amount of precipitation and the appearance of this insect, because in wet seasons we have had more trouble.

Mr. Geo. J. Kellogg: If cities can spray with water why would it not answer in the country?

Mr. Bues: There were but few cases that came under my observation in the country where the trees were infested. If it was found in a small town which had no water pressure I would use the fire engine and hose. In the country the only thing to do is to spray with a regular spray of kerosene emulsion, and spray in the winter, and if the trees are too badly affected you. have to cut them back and then spray. The trouble is mostly in the cities and larger towns, and you find it sometimes on the farms around the towns. Any community that will plant its maples close together will get it.

Mr. Geo. J. Kellogg: Why not cut out the soft maples and save the elms?

Mr. Bues: I honor that recommendation. I say let the maples die and plant more elms. We are all satisfied that the elm is better, but if you take a place where nearly all the trees are maples and you take them all out you will have a treeless town.

The President: I have noticed sometimes where there are two or three maples sometimes only one is infested.

Mr. Bues: That was just the beginning of the infestation. The young had hatched and were probably moving in the tree. If the trees are planted only fifteen or twenty feet apart there is nothing to hinder their progress.

Mr. Root: I found in Milwaukee on Fourteenth street and also on Grand avenue that the elms were infested by an insect which I should judge was very much similar to the cotton moth. Every tree was covered with a dark brown mass of cocoons, and I should think the body of the tree contained perhaps a hundred of those cocoons.

Mr. Bues: That was the second insect described, the white spotted tussock moth.

Mr. Root: Is that the insect working in Milwaukee?

Mr. Bues: Milwaukee is full of it. You should go to work and pick off those cocoons and then adopt the spraying process, but these two must go together.

AFTERNOON SESSION.

HARDY HERBACEOUS PERENNIALS.

JOHN TIPLADY, Lake Geneva.

My subject for today is the Hardy Herbaceous Perennials, a class of plants that are yearly gaining favor with the flowerloving American public.

Pardon me if I dwell occasionally on the paeonia, phlox, columbine, or any of the plants about which other gentlemen will address you later on, or advance any theory with reference to perennials of the wild.

The successful cultivator of the hardy perennial will first bear in mind that the soil must be well prepared by incorporating a liberal supply of manure making sure that the drainage is perfect.

If a veranda porch is first to be planted it must be planted with a perennial climber. Only in exceptional cases must we use an annual, which is such a bother to train on strings and finally tear down in the fall. If the location is permanent, then plant a permanent vine, that you may enjoy each year until the very height of its beauty has been realized. Who can imagine a more gratifying sight than a beautiful clematis in full bloom, stretching its flowery existence across your veranda, affording healthful shade to the owner. Several worthy clematis are now on the market. Montana grandiflora blooms in May, coccinea in June, Jackmanii in July, and paniculata in September. Jackmanii, the universal favorite, has not been superseded by any variety of that color and habit, improving in splendor as it advances in years, and like civilization, annually reaching out for newer fields to cover, and the same may be said of

paniculata, recognized as the choicest and most satisfactory climber up to date. When well grown it always pleases the most fastidious lover of nature.

Another good climber is the purple wisteria. In Central Park, New York, it is used almost exclusively for covering rustic arbors, and during May and early June they are a veritable mass of purple. The secret of success is in the pruning. Cut them back as you would a grape vine or a red-currant.

For covering a brick building use ampelopsis Englemanii, whose tendrils resemble the foot of a tree toad, clinging to the smoothest surface. Ampelopsis quinquifolia has to be supported by wire, or whilst loaded with moisture or struck by a gale it will sometimes get loose and fall to the ground a twisted mass of vegetation. Veitchii is not hardy and cannot be relied

upon.

It is pleasing to look at a perennial garden and to notice the diversity of fragrance and color. There is no class of ornamental plants that can equal the hardy herbaceous perennial in popular favor nor in merit. Some of them continue to bloom for weeks or months while others are only on display for a short time but they make up for it by the beauty of the blossoms they produce.

Perennials can be secured in every gradation of size and color, and with a little care in selecting varieties a constant succession of bloom can be maintained through the entire summer.

People are beginning to realize that it is better to plant perennials which come up year after year, than to bother with annuals altogether. But do not think that I am relegating the annual into the backwoods of oblivion-not much. They have a duty to perform in every garden and we will always have our sweet peas, and asters in endless variety, marigolds and zinnas to keep grandmother's patch fresh in our minds-snapdragon, cornflowers, mignonette and cosmos. But we want to encourage the hardy herbaceous perennial. When there is an attempt to say which perennial is the best, there will probably be a dozen named by people as their favorites, and there would be reasonableness in the arguments in favor of each. For instance, the beautiful columbine, whose champions have organized a columbine society, the paeonia, whose champions have organized a paeonia society, some one would plead the golden rod, common but beautiful- our national flower-we would also hear from the

Funkia, hemerocallis, coreopsis delphinium, phlox, larkspur, Dahlia and gladiolus, many of which are indispensable, and in fact have a popularity that puts them in a class by themselves. The value of the perennial phlox for instance lies in its fragrance, diversity of color, and long blooming period. The iris, whose very name signifies "rainbow," has a wonderfully delicate range and combination of color. Both of these plants will be duly discussed at this meeting by gentlemen who have papers prepared on the subject.

The rose colored spikes of lythrum when seen growing to perfection, the tips of its rosy colored spikes reaching 6–7 feet high, blooming as it does through June, July and August, presents a very satisfactory appearance when planted among shrubbery in clumps or blended with the yellow flowers of heliopsis or hemerocallis, bordered with that persistent flowering perennial, Achillea roseum (the pink variety of Milfoil.) But keep the blue away from this combination or there will be discord. In planting for effect allow a clump of shrubbery or a building of some kind to break the view before planting your blue delphiniums, aconite, platycodons or for-get-me-nots. For yellow effect we have the different varieties of helianthus, heliopsis, heleniums and Rudbeckias, all tall growing plants, with hemerocallis or anthemis tinctora for a border. By this list you would naturally infer that all yellow perennials commence with H, but they don't.

For a pink and white effect in some desirable nook or corner, what is more pleasure than a group of herbaceous spirea with that stately variety aruncus with its tall pampas-like plumes for a background against the shrubbery-in front of this spirea Chinensis, a distinct and handsome species with its handsome white flowers, a little dwarfer in habit than the preceding onebordered with that valuable little double variety filapendula fl. pl. with a clump located at one end and near the back of crimson meadow sweet, your combination is complete (pink and white).

If a red effect is desired at some distant point of view plant monarda didyma (known as bee balm-Oswego tea). Horse mint must be valuable, but this must be limited in size as the color is intense. Another plant worthy of cultivation is the Boltonia, a tall growing plant with pink and white aster-like blossoms produced in profusion during August and September.