The Florida agriculturist., 1889-05-29
The Lady Bird as a Scale Exterminator
LOOKING TO THE LITTLE LADY BIRD TO

ers, our Florida people have been quite
fortunatei in their encounter with the scale
insect. The future, however, may have
in store for us more difficulty with this
little pest, and it is well enough to pre-
pare for war in time OF peace.
The following extract which we take
from the Los Angeles Express tells an
interesting story about the introduction
of the Australian lady bird in California,
and their effective work:
1t had hardly been demonstrated to
the satisfaction of the fruit growers in
Southern California that oranges could
be raised and marketed from this section
with profit to the grower, than the scale
bug, known to science as the Icerya Pur
chasi, became so prevalent here that trees
in a. good state of health were entirely
destroyed and thousands ofdollars which
had been invested in orange orchards
were lost. Every remedy known to the
horticultural world was tried, trees were
sprayed, washed, fumigated, disinfected
and treated in hundreds of different ways,
and still the scale bug thrived, and
orchards which had withstood the first
onslaught of the pest were being fast in
fected and the prospects were favorable
to total extinction of the business of
growing the golden fruit for market.
One of the gentlemen in Southern Cali
fornia who deeply regretted the advent of
the Icerya here was j. W. Wolfskill, who
with his head gardener, Alexander Craw,
were driven to their wits end to fight the
pest. Finally Mr.. Craw, who is thor
oughly acquainted with his profession and
had a good knowledge of the methods of
growing oranges in Australia, persuaded
Prof. B. C. Riley, the State EntomolOgist,
to come down here and look over the
orchards and see if he could not suggest
some efficacious remedy. Prof. Riley
came and confessed that he knew ofnoth-
ing that would kill off the scale fast
enough to afford relief to the orange
growers Mr.. Craw then suggested that
since the pest had been successfully fought
in Australia, either Prof. Riley or one of
his assistants should go to that country
and discover the parasite which had
cleared the Australian orchards.
This suggestion was afterwards acted
upon, and Assistant State Entomologist
Albert Koebele went to Australia and had
not been there very long before hediscov-
cred what he was looking for in the Aus
tralian lady bird, or Vedolia Cardinals,
and the Lestophronus Icerya, the first a
species of beetle and the second
species of fly The first mentioned insect
was evidently the best for this country,
for it not only bred great deal faster
than the scale bug, but in it's every form
but that of the pupa it preyed on the
scale, and destroyed itfaster thanitcould
breed The fly takes four months to ma
ture, and then will only make war on the
adult scale bug
While in Australia Professor Koebele
found it difficult to secure specimens of the
ladybird, as it was also preyed upon by
other insects, which killed it off very fast.
He secured enough, however, to make sew
eral shipments, but here again another
difficulty showed itself, as he packed them
in tin boxes and when they reached their
destination in California they had all