Entomological Division. 



The Black Peach Aphis. — Ajplds persiae-niger. Order Ilernip 



tera / family, Aphididte. 



A small brownish black plant-louse often appearing in great 

 nmnbers upon the leaves, twigs and roots of young peach trees, 

 frequently dwarfing and often causing the death of the tree. 



The object of this article is to call the attention of peach grow- 

 ers to the fact that a very serious insect pest is being inti'oduced 

 into our State upon nursery stock purchased in other States. 

 A correspondent in Niagara county has introduced the pest into 

 liis <irohard of twenty acres by filliug in the places where trees 

 had died with infested trees received last sipring from a nursery 

 in Delaware. A few infested trees which were left over were 

 trenched near some pits just planted; the pest soon found its way 

 to the young seedlings, and by midsummer nearly every seedling 

 had succumbed to the attacks of the aphids. So far as we know 

 this is the first instance of the occurrence of this insect in our 

 State, but probably other growers have suffered previously more 

 or less in other localities without knowing the cause. 



The insect is very common throughout the whole of the great 

 peach growing districts of New Jersey, Delaware, Maryland and 

 Vu'ginia. Growers there say it is more to be dreaded than the 

 borer (Sannina exitiosa), and in destructiveness it ranks next to 

 the fearful mysterious disease of Peach Yellows. Trees less than 

 three years old suffer the most. In 1890, nearly 100,000 in a 

 single nursery in one of these States were killed in two or three 

 weeks' time, while many other large nurseries were either entirely 

 destroyed or very badly affected, and many orchardists were com- 

 pelled to replant hundreds of trees. Nurserymen, and those who 

 are starting peach orchai'ds, can thus see what fearful havoc may 

 result if this pest is once introduced among their trees. 



Indications of the presence of the pest. — As the pest often con- 

 fines its attacks almost entirely to the roots of the trees, its deadly 



