A dictionary of modern gardening - University Library

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OTI 413 OX A
fleshy, slightly curvei^, and having numerous
short rigid hairs on the body.
About the middle of May these grubs
change into white pupae, which have no
cocoons, but are placed in oval cells, in
the earth, perfectly smooth on the inside.
They remain in the pupa state
about fourteen days, and become beetles.
In this latter state they are quite
black, and the elytra, or wing-cases,
are rather deeply furrowed. In the
Berlin Botanic Garden they have been
found to infest the roots of saxifrages
and trollius, growing in the open border,
and cause their death.
" The only methods of destroying
them are, at this time of the year, to
examine the roots of sedums and other
succulent plants, and crush all that may
be found ; and in June, when the perfect
insects appear, to look among the
pots, where they are usually lurking,
and kill them as soon as they come out,
upon the elytra ; but they soon wear
off and disappear, when it becomes of
a shining black, inclining to a pitchcolour.
" The larvae of these otiorhynci being
as destructive as the perfect beetles,
the main object ought to be to destroy
the former, if possible, in the autumn,
which probably would be most readily
effected by stirring the earth all along
the base of the wall and round the
stems of the fruit-trees, and then sprinkling
salt pretty thickly over the broken
surface; or salt and water, or, perhaps,
liquid-manure, might be equally beneficial—
if hot the better; for it seems
evident, from the peculiar spots in
which they generate, or rather undergo
their transformations, that situations
sheltered in a great measure from the
wet are most congenial to their habits.
The beetles can only be arrested by
hand-picking, with a candle and lantern,
and afterwards pouring boiling
water upon them, as their shells resist
moderate heat." —Gard. Chron.
0. notatus attacks the young shoots
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before they have time to deposit their
eggs." Gard. Chron.
O. tenebricosus. Red-legged gardenweevil.
" The
Mr. Curtis says,
maggots of the red-legged of the raspberry and rose, piercing
garden-weevil are found round the base them to the pith.
of the stems of wail-fruit, sometimes OXALIS. Wood-sorrel. One hun-
in very great quantities, a few inches dred and twenty-four species. Chiefly
below the surface, where they undergo green-house half-hardy and hardy bulbs,
their transformations. The beetles,
which are old offenders, come out only
though some are shrubs, others herbaceous,
and a few annuals. The bulbs
at night to feed upon the buds of wall- are increased by offsets, the shrubs by
fruit, doing great mischief to apricots, cuttings, the herbaceous by division,
peaches, nectarines, plums, &c. They and the annuals by seed. They all
first destroy the fruit, and subsequently thrive in sandy loam, manured with
attack the bark and leaves, so as not leaf mould. See Sorrel.
unfrequently to endanger the life of the 0. Deppii.— Plant bulbs of this in
trees. They commence their depreda- pots, at the beginning of March, and
tions in April by eating the unexpanded
blossom-buds, clearing out the centre,
shelter in a cold pit or
When all fear of frost is
green-house.
passed plant
and leaving only the external bractea, them in a light soil, and in a southern
and occasionally fragments of the im- aspect, about twelve inches apart each
mature leaves. They will thus proceed way; or the bulbs may be kept out of
along a branch until all the buds are the ground altogether until the middle
destroyed, and afterwards demolish the of April, and then be planted at once
young eyes which ought to produce in the open soil. It should be trenched,
wood-shoots, until nothing is left but and a little manure turned in with the
the bare branches.
" The beetles bury themselves by
bottom
crops.
spit, as for other tap-rooted
The scaly bulbs, from which it
day in the earth, close to the founda- is propagated, grow in a cluster round
tion of the wall to which the trees are the crown of the root. The only culti-
trained, likewise round the stems of vation required, is to keep the crop
the trees, and most probably in chinks free from weeds, and to water plenti-
of the bricks, and other dark hidingplaces.
When recently hatched it is
fully in dry weather ; otherwise, if the
roots are allowed to become dry, they
clothed with a delicate yellow pube- split upon the occurrence of moist
Bcence, forining little irregular spots weather. Protect from early frosts, in