My Grandfather had a large apple orchard, and being a dutiful grandson I was press ganged into helping with the annual spraying of the trees against the coddling moth pest.

We used a tar wash spray administered with an old stirrup pump. My grandfather insisted the task be done just after the blossom had fallen in order to capture the female moth laying her eggs. I was somewhat of a dubious labourer, since being an amateur lepidopterist I knew the moth laid her egss in the heart of the blossom so that the apple grew around the eggs and the newly born grub/larvae could eat its way out.

I argued with some conviction that to spray after the blossom had fallen was a useless exersize since the grub was already in situ.

Grandfather never accepted my theory arging quite as forcibly that the grub ate its way in.

When I asked why one never found fat grubs inside the apple he countered with the aside that having ate its way in, it was so tired that it came out along the tunnel it had just excavated.

There really was no arguing with him and I performed my duties with grudging respect.

Then one year just before he died, having attended his weekly Evensong  at 6 oclock on Sunday evening he told me he had been given guidance by the Almighty to listen to his grandson.

'Next year son' ,he said, 'we will spray a week earlier'. We never did for grandfather died on March 3rd the following year. He went to his grave never having  resolved the debate

Coddling moth interlude
At grandfathers behest
Wednesday seduction 
Grandmother knows best
How the girl at the gate
Will Make me late for prep

A girl with designs on me
Grandmother can see
There is nothing to hide
Not really my type
After Jennifer hurt me
And I almost cried there and then

But Bluecoat school hero's
Do not cry
They just pretend
Not to hurt

No one in a skirt
Will get me again
Yet what a surprise
Were  sweet Carols eyes
In late Wednesday sunshine
Just before prep

And in Saturday June
Well before noon at Whitsuntide
Pentecost duty it's a secular kind
Miss lawrence wont mind
If we do it again

We are spraying the Apples
And when It's all over
What beautiful apples there'll be
No coddling Moth grubs will you see
For we have the beating of them
Grandfather and me 

Yet  debate is so strong
He thinks I am wrong
And the coddling moth female
Though feeling quite pale
Will lay eggs after the blossom has fallen

No! No!say I
Although i'm a boy
Please listen with joy 
To my version
May I just mention 
A simple fact of nature

Grandfather  take heed
And follow my lead
For here is the rub
The coddling moth grub
Without any doubt
and It may be a sin
Doesnt eat its way in
It eats its way out

So the whitsuntide day
With tar wash spray
Simply became a foolish
Exersize.

We should spray
Before the blossom falls
And Miss Lawrences calls
To mind all her washing
Simply so shocking
The weekend before Whitsuntide
Try not to hide your shame
Grandfather

And on late summer Sunday
The battle all won
You were right my grandson
But only this year
Sometimes i am wrong
And now your are knowing
I am going to thank the lord for his guidance
At Evensong