I.— 8a

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Mr. J. N. Williams examined* 44. Hon. the Chairman.'] What are you? —Sheep-farmer. 45. Where do you reside ?—At Hastings, in Hawke's Bay. 46. What experience have you had in fruit-culture ?—I have had, outside the ordinary garden experience, which I have had pretty well all my life, during the last seven years an orchard of 10 acres in extent. 47. Have you had experience in dealing with fruit-pests?—-Yes. 48. And especially with the codlin-moth ?—■ Not especially with the codlin-moth, because there are so many pests, many of them equally bad. 49. "What means have you used to get rid of the pests, and with what result ?—For fungus of various kinds I find that blue-stone (sulphide of copper) is the best. 50. Have you ever used spraying?— Yes, for insects. For the scale—and there are various kinds of scale-blights —I find that resin, whale-oil, and two or three other ingredients, which I need not specify, are effective. 51. Do you use Paris green ?—Not at first for the scale. Later on, when the proper time comes, I use the Paris green for the codlin-moth. 52. Do you bandage the trees? —Yes. 53. For the codlin-mofch at first ?—Well, the first thing to do with the codlin-moth is to spray. I spray about the Ist November. Of course, the time would vary in different districts, and it would also vary slightly according with the kind of apple you are dealing with. The commencement of spraying wants to be done just after the fruit is set, and that varies about a fortnight with different kinds of fruit. There is no hard-and-fast rule as to the time at which spraying should be commenced. When you have done one tree it may not be proper to do another. I commence spraying on the Ist November, and put on bands of old sacking, or something of that kind, on every tree. These bands have to be examined every ten days or a fortnight, right up to the very end of the summer. The spray has to be repeated about the middle of November again. Then I spray again from the beginning of December on to the middle of December. The trees and fruit have to be watched, and a man who understands his business should know whether a tree requires spraying or not. I spray again in the beginning of January, and then again in February ; and that is the last spraying that will be necessary—that is, for late apples, for the early ones would have been gathered before that. If wet weather comes immediately after any spraying it has to be repeated, for wet weather washes the arsenic off the trees. Speaking generally, if you are fortunate in the weather, five sprayings would be sufficient for late cooking-apples. I think that is enough to &&y about spraying. With regard to the bands on the tree, they must be examined every ten days or fortnight, and all the grubs destroyed, and the bandages properly replaced. All the apples falling from the trees must be carefully collected and put in hot water or something else that will destroy the grubs. It is also necessary in storing apples to store them in a moth-proof house, for two reasons : if the grub has been very bad (as it will be for the first year or two when proper treatment has been neglected) and the apples are stored in an open building where the moth can get in they will strike the fruit in a most remarkable manner. 54. What is a moth-proof house ?—A house in which the ventilation is made with perforated zinc, such as you would use in a meat-safe. 55. Will that keep out the moth ?—Yes ; it has this double advantage : that if you store apples affected with the grub the moths are imprisoned ; when they come out in the spring they cannot get out of the house. I have found that a wonderful benefit. It has also taught me this—it is a curious thing and may not be generally known : that the crop of grubs which are put away for the winter, and which are to supply the succeeding crop of moths for next year, will begin to hatch as early as September, and they will go on hatching till the 31st December. Presumably this last lot was a fresh hatch, but in reality it is not so, and the fact is that the hatching is spread over three or four months. As far as my experience goes, I believe that if a district had a proper system of inspection it would be very useful. I may say we have never had any worth the name yet. Ido not know what may be the case in other districts, but my experience is that we have not had an Inspector who has had any knowledge of his duties in this respect. He comes round and asks how your orchard is getting on, and what you have done with regard to the codlin-moth, but, as far as my experience goes, the Inspectors do not teach you anything. Anything I have learned I have learned for myself. I have gained a good deal of information from the Government leaflets, and by following the directions given in them I have been assisted very much; but I have also learned other necessary things which you cannot gain a knowledge of in that way. 56. Have you no resident Inspector ?—There is a person who comes round and asks questions, but as to giving any information with regard to the destruction of pests, the thing is not done at all. They might impart information which would enable people to do something, but in many cases they do not impart information, because I do not believe they have got it. 57: What is the general practice in your district, as far as you know, in dealing with the pests ? Do they follow a systematic rule ?—As far as I know, they generally read the leaflet, and believe that by spraying for the codlin-moth once or twice it will be killed. These people are full of energy, and they go out and shower their trees with an amount of spray enough to drown them. They do that twice, and then they say, " I have done what the book says will kill the moth," and there is no result. There is a district near me with several orchards belonging to different people, who had every trust that what they had done would kill the codlin-moth with the greatest ease, but in process of time it came to this : that 90 per cent, of the fruit falls from the trees, and these apples are packed away in carts and sent to the nearest cider-manufactory, and made into firstclass cider, grubs and all. The apples are packed in heaps, and kept there for some time. They are not made into cider at once, and the grub crawls out and gets into the sacks, and thus a stock of the pest is laid up for the next season,