June, '13] TOWNSEND: COTTON SCALE 327 



A Piojo Blanco Quarantine 



Peru needs to guard against the spread of this insect southward 

 from Piura through the other cotton districts of her coast region. 

 All the ports of the Peruvian coast south of Sechura should exercise 

 a rigid quarantine against all the ports from Sechura to Panama, 

 both inclusive, so far as plant importations are concerned. The 

 piojp bianco exists in practically the whole west coast region from 

 Panama south to Sechura, and infests a very great variety of plants. 

 It may therefore be very easily brought to the uninfested region south 

 of Sechura on almost any plant shipi}ed from ports in the infested re- 

 gion. All plants entering Peruvian ports to the south of Sechura, 

 arriving on vessels of whatsoever description from the north, should 

 be subjected to the most severe scrutiny by competent persons, and 

 if any scale of any kind is found on them, such plants should be com- 

 pletely destroyed. If they are merely scrubbed with insecticide and 

 allowed to enter, the chances are ninety-nine to one that some of 

 the microscopic young of the scale will escape the treatment and 

 establish the plague at the port entered, whence it will later spread 

 to the surrounding districts. The possibility of the piojo bianco 

 gaining access to the cotton districts of the central coast region of 

 Peru constitutes a most serious menace to the whole Peruvian cotton 

 crop. While it is quite certain that the insect could not prove so 

 injurious in the central coast region of Peru as it has in the Piura 

 region, owing to the much greater atmospheric humidity prevailing 

 in the former which would keep its enemies active during a greater 

 part of the year, nevertheless its damage would quite certainly reach 

 at least 20 per cent in any part of that region. It thus constitutes 

 an impending menace, against which it behooves the Peruvian Gov- 

 ernment to guard to the limits of its ability. 



A SUCCESSFUL TRAP FOR COCKROACHES 



By F. L. Washburn, Minnesota 



Mr. S. A. Graham of this Division has devised a simple trap for 

 catching cockroaches, which works most successfully. 



We have personally tried various contrivances on the market and 

 others of our own devising, but find Mr. Graham's trap far better than 

 anything we have met with. It consists of a flat-bottomed water 

 flask, as shown in the accompanying drawing, in the mouth of which is 

 introduced a paper cone (see illustration). This cone is held in place 

 with a little vaseline smeared around the inside of the neck of the 

 flask. The opening at the smaller end of the cone is f of an inch in 



