Yesterday's common
sense ideas to help you maintain and enjoy your country home,
garden, landscape and property.
From The
Register of Rural Affairs, 1868
After trying various modes for protecting melons and cucumbers
from the striped bug and other insects, we find the following
superior to any other. Two small twigs of osier or other slender
wood, about a foot and a half or two feet long, are bent over the
hill of young plants and the ends thrust in the ground, as
represented by fig. 1. A newspaper is then placed upon these
curved sticks covering the whole, and the edges are fastened down
all around by a covering of earth as shown in fig. 2. This
constitutes the whole contrivance, and affords complete protection
from all insects; the paper being thin and porous, admits a
sufficient supply of air and light, at the same time sheltering
from cold winds. Plants thus protected have grown twice as fast as
those fully exposed. Another advantage of this mode is the
protection it affords from night frosts, rendering it admirably
adapted to plants which have been early removed from the hot-bed.
Lastly and not least, is its cheapness. A gardener will apply it
to a dozen hills in as many minutes by the watch, the material
costing nothing to any one who takes a political newspaper.
Unless the paper is very thin and fragile, heavy rains will not
break it. Strong plants sometimes burst through; but a better way,
when they become large, is to tear a hole in the top, as shown in
fig. 3, the remaining paper at the sides still affording some
protection, although plants of this size are usually safe from
injury.
