112 GOOSEBERRY. 



House, St. Albans. The female scales were numerous on the 

 old wood, and mainly beneath the branches, where they were 

 sheltered from weather, and especially where the bark was 

 often split, or had peeled away so as to expose the under 

 surface ; but (up to this date) the infestation was not notice- 

 able on shoots of the preceding year's growth, although the 

 larvae and (therefore necessarily) the female scales had for 

 some time previously been observable on the bushes. 



The larvfB (or maggots) were so small as to be almost 

 invisible to the naked eye, narrowly oval in shape, with six 

 legs, and a pair of horns (see figures, p. 110). The colour 

 was various, but of some shade of puce, or reddish, or ochrey 

 tint, and the body somewhat raised along the middle so as to 

 form a slight keel ; the abdomen of the larvae, as well as the 

 female scales, showing a more or less noticeable caudal cleft. 



The female scales were hemispherical in shape, sometimes 

 curved slightly outwards at the lowest edge ; the colour some 

 shade of nut brown, or rich brown; the size variable, ranging 

 from an eighth of an inch to rather more ; the width about 

 equal to the length, and the height about one-twelfth of an 

 inch, or rather more in the middle. In the best defined 

 specimens the border was finely ribbed transversely ; the rest 

 of the surface was so irregularly varied, according to age or 

 condition of scale, as to make it impossible to give a precise 

 description. 



Later in the season (on the 6th of June) the female scales 

 were plentiful on the old wood of some Gooseberry bushes 

 which had not been particularly attended to, and in most 

 instances were full of eggs. Sometimes the old skin of the 

 mother scale was almost empty, but in others the quantity 

 of eggs was astonishing, the exceedingly small oval-shaped 

 bodies falling like a shower of white dust, which might be 

 said to cover a space of half an inch square, and well sprinkled 

 about an inch. The scales, which frequently contained the 

 lobed, fleshy, greyish female Lecanium within them, were now 

 of diflerent sizes, and of various colour and condition, some 

 being shrunken, so as to show transverse corrugations, and 

 some plump and rounded. 



About a month after (on the 11th of July) a few females 

 were scattered on the old branches, some long dead and 

 flattened against the boughs with the colour faded, others 

 still bright brown and shiny. Beneath them, in some in- 

 stances, eggs were still noticeable, but commonly empty egg- 

 shells were the most observable presence, together with some 

 eggs still unhatched, and some recently hatched or hatching 

 larvae. And towards the end of July, though I found little 

 larval presence on the Gooseberry bushes, I found, at the 



