Rensselaer Gazette, Volume 2, Number 2, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 12 May 1858 — farmer's Department. [ARTICLE]

farmer's Department.

CONDUCTED 1 BY Alt AGRICULTURIST.

Catterpillar Prevention. A plan, lately patented, to prevent worms elimbing trees, looks as though it would be effectual. A tin trough is made in two parts, large enough to encircle the tree and leave a space four or five inches between the trough and bole of the tree. From the outside edge of the trough a strip of cloth extends all around, wide enough to have its upper edge tackeif to thie tree, by which the trough, filled with oil, is sheltered from rain and sustained in its place, so that worms creeping upward come-first in contact with the cloth, and if they crawl down that to get around the edge and so up the tree, they are eaught in the oil, which, being sheltered, remains longer than when exposed in good condition. Now it is an experiment worth trying, arid for which there is no patent, whether a strip of clqth nailed around the tree at one edge, and having the other ex tended six inches from the bole by a wire or limber rod, would not answer the purpose without the oil-troueh. The under side of the cloth could be coated with some kind of pitch that would pot harden soon? being protected from the sun and rain, which would effectually prevent the ascension of insects certainly much more so than the belt of tar as it is usually applied. v —^