No. 105.] 277 



evening, and sprinkled several of the heads with tolerably fresh air- 

 slaked lime, until they were white with the powder adhering to them y 

 thus applying it far more profusely and effectually than can be accom- 

 plished by any " sowing" of this substance. With the light of a lan- 

 tern, these heads were now closely watched, and the flies were ob- 

 served to hover around and alight upon them as freely, and insert their 

 ovipositors with the same readiness that they did upon the contiguous 

 heads that were not thus treated. I deem this experiment sufficient to 

 put to rest the much mooted question with regard to the utility of lime 

 as a shield against the wheat-fly. 



A yet more prominent, and much more plausible mode of enabling 

 the wheat to escape injury from the fly, is, sowing the seed at such 

 times as will prevent its being in blossom at the period when the in- 

 sect appears. With this view, it is recommended to sow winter wheat 

 much earlier than was ordinarily done, that it may be so far matured 

 the following season at the time of the appearance of the fly, as to be 

 invulnerable to it ; and spring wheat, so late as not to be in blossom 

 until the fly has finished depositing its eggs. This plan has been much 

 relied upon, on both sides of the Atlantic, and I have been heretofore 

 disposed to regard it as probably the most feasible of any — though by 

 avoiding Scylla we are in danger of Charybdis — for early sown win- 

 ter wheat invites a return of the Hessian fly, and late sown spring 

 wheat is almost certain in this vicinity to be attacked by " the rust" 

 {Puccinia graminis). Numerous instances, moreover, can be adduced 

 which tend much to support the utility of this measure. One of these, 

 as strong as any that has come to my knowledge, I may here state. 

 In a field of spring wheat of my own, raised in 1843, every kernel in 

 the top of almost every head was entirely destroyed, whilst the lower 

 two-thirds or three-fourths of the ears were wholly uninjured. I could 

 account for this only by supposing that these heads were just begin- 

 ning to be protruded from their sheaths as the operations of the fly 

 were closing for that year ; and hence confidently inferred that if that 

 wheat had been sowed a few days later, it would have escaped entire- 

 ly, or a few days earlier, it would have been entirely destroyed. By 

 a reference to my Farm Book, I find this crop was sowed April 26th, 

 and cradled August 10th, but no note was taken of the time when it 

 was in blossom. I must confess, however^that my observations the 

 present season have greatly diminished my confidence in the time of 



