STATE HORTICULTUEAL SOCIETY. 97 



believe, therefore, either that the observations need corroboration, or 

 that there was some other influence at work detrimental to the cur- 

 culio beside the mere character of the reaction of the native fruit. 

 And yet these observations are well worth careful testing, and this I 

 should have attempted this year, if the plum crop in our region had 

 not wholly failed. Those who raise plums in any variety can easily 

 help us to a conclusion in this very interesting matter, by simply 

 shipping to us another year speckled plums, native and European. 

 We will then undertake to select those that contain curculio eggs or 

 young ; to breed these and to determine how the varieties, foreign 

 and native, compare with respect to the number of curculios ma- 

 tured. 



Who knows positively whether it is true that the muck-worms 

 of the compost heap — commonly mistaken for white grubs, and in- 

 deed very closely resembling them — really injure vegetation when 

 distributed with the manure? 



The red spider sometimes damages the foliage of the apple in 

 this State. Who has seen it? It is well worth while to know how 

 generally this occurs. 



Another mite much more minute than this — the grape phytop- 

 tus — has been destructive here and there, doing serious but unsus- 

 pected mischief in the vineyard. It causes in the Old World one of 

 the common diseases of the vine, and affects here the smooth, thin- 

 leaved varieties, causing the tender leaves in spring to wrinkle and 

 curl, raising the surface in smooth, irregular warts, as if the leaf had 

 been shriveled by contracting all of the vines. This little pest should 

 be as well known to you as to the grape-growers of the other hemi- 

 sphere. How many of you have it in your vineyards? 



The borers of the apple tree have been extraordinarily destruct- 

 ive this year and last, owing, no doubt, to the excessive drouth. 

 How many know whether your trees are worst infested by the round- 

 headed or the flat headed kind, and whether the soap treatment, 

 which will protect the trees against the latter, will serve for the 

 former also? 



How many have noticed in the trunks and larger branches 

 of your plum trees, mining beneath the bark, a pale, reddish- 

 brown, boring caterpiller, about half an iuch long, with a dark- 

 brown head and scattered hairs, the body soft and provided 

 with numerous pairs of legs? This is a new thing in the plum; 

 new, also, as to the life history, its species, in fact, not yet de- 

 termined, and not determinable until bred to the adult. It seems 

 to belong to a genus, one species of which damages the plum in 

 Europe by mining in the alburnum and sap-wood, doing there greater 

 mischief to this and allied fruits. It was received by me August 31, 

 from Mr. Buckman, of Farmingdale, and is now wintering as a liv- 

 ing larva, having spun tough protective webs among the rubbish in 

 the bottom of the cage. It is probable, however, that if undisturbed, 

 it would have wintered in its burrows beneath the bark. 



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