34 ENTOMOLOGICAL NEWS. [February, 



Gloucester, N. J., we got in the neighborhood of some tumble-down 

 shanties; at the back gate of one that opened on a lot covered with weeds 

 stood a woman, with arms akimbo, intently watching our manoeuvres, 

 when my friend captured a specimen of Limenitis ursula, at which the 

 curiosity of the aforesaid female was sufficiently aroused to ask the ques- 

 tion, "What do you do with them things?" " Oh," said he, " we preserve 

 .them." Lifting up her hands in apparent disgust, she said, " Sakes 

 alive, what'll people eat next!" On another occasion, while collecting 

 along the Camden and Atlantic Railroad, I saw, in a narrow gully that 

 ran parallel to the track, a portion of a dead snake, which I saw move, 

 and, concluding there was a " bug" at work, I turned it over and found a 

 male Necrophorus americana; while looking for the female, which I 

 presently found, a countryman, walking along the track, stopped and 

 looked down at me just as I dropped it in my bottle and said, " What do 

 you do with them air things?" but before I had time to frame an answer 

 he continued, "do you make medsin of 'em?" I said "yes;" he then 

 said, "yaas, I've heern tell of that afore." C. A. B. 



IT may be of interest to the readers of the NEWS to know that here in 

 Oregon we are sympathizers and sufferers with our eastern friends from 

 that dread pest of hop growers the hop louse (Phorodan huniitli], being 

 the same as has been doing so much damage heretofore in the Eastern 

 States. It has been described and written about extensively by the De- 

 partment of Agriculture at Washington, D. C., and a further description 

 would be out of place here. The hop crop of Washington for the year 

 1890 has been estimated at 38,000 bales, that of Oregon some 18,000 less, 

 making a total of 58,000 bales, which may be figured at least within a very 

 reasonable limit at 200 pounds to the bale and 30 cents per pound, or 

 $60 per bale, or $3,480,000 for the crop. The loss from the hop louse, 

 where I have been able to observe, was at least one-fourth of what was 

 gathered, or one-fifth of the entire crop, and from the best I have been 

 able to learn the loss was about the same in other places; those exposed 

 to the morning sun and sheltered from the wind by woods, etc., suffered 

 most, the upper river bottoms in general next, while some places were 

 almost free from them. By taking one-fourth of those saved, the larger 

 amount of which was more or less damaged, it shows the remarkable loss 

 of $870,000 from those little insects alone, so inconspicuous, yet in num- 

 bers so formidable. In some localities they came too late to do much 

 damage, but where they came early they carried destruction with them. 

 From the above figures we conclude it would be well for hop growers to 

 avail themselves of the benefits to be derived from the painstaking re- 

 searches of our government and let it guide them to the avoidance, if 

 possible, of a similar visitation next year. AURELIUS TODD. 



A FOREST PLAGUE IN BAVARIA. The current Kew Bulletin contains 

 several documents describing a terrible pest which has attacked the Ba- 

 varian pine forests. It is known as the Nonnen, and is caused by the 

 caterpillar of the moth Liparis monacha, which has regularly attacked 



