December, '10] Chittenden and marsh : tarnished plant-bug 477 



nearly 8% of the total jield of 114, while two other trees jdelded 

 44 wormy apples which comprised 9.93 and 7.02% of their total prod- 

 uct. Here we have an instance of one tree producing one fifth as 

 many wormy apples yet bearing a higher percentage of wormy fruit, 

 while two others in this plot, each with 44 worm}^ apples, gave a per- 

 centage variation of 2.91. Again, in plot 2 of series 2 the maximum 

 number of wormy apples, namely 295 amounted to but 13.06% of 

 the total yield of the tree, while the smallest number of wormy apples, 

 namely 28, constituted 20.91% of the product of another. In other 

 words, the tree with 10 times as many wormy apples produced a 

 markedly smaller percentage of wormy fruit. Likewise, the very 

 low percentages of sound fruit obtained in series 3 is due not so much 

 to the large number of wormj^ apples as to the small crop. The 

 Wealthy trees, for example, had but 5 to 48 wormy apples, an aver- 

 age of only a little over 26 per tree, while in the case of the Mackin- 

 tosh the wormy fruit ranged from 8 to 69, an average of a little over 

 37 per tree. Comparing these figures "wdth the wormy fruit pro- 

 duced by the two plots spraj'ed but once in 1909, we shall see that 

 there were only half as many wormy apples, yet the percentages of 

 sound fruit for these two plots are extremel}^ low. We call attention 

 to this matter simply to emphasize the fact that percentage compari- 

 sons alone are not always fair. The actual number of wormy apples 

 on the trees in series 1 and series 3 are less than those obtained in 

 1909, and while we wash the percentages were better, we feel that the 

 discrepancy between the results obtained in the two seasons is not 

 so wide as would at first appear. 



NOTE ON THE OVIPOSITION OF THE TARNISHED 

 PLANT-BUG 



By r. H. Chittenden and H. O. Marsh 



In 1884 Dr. S. A. Forbes wrote an exhaustive account of the tar- 

 nished plant-bug, four stages of the nymphs being recognized, described 

 in detail, and figured, but at that time nothing was published in re- 

 gard to the egg or the method of its deposition. The following year 

 this account was supplemented by a description of the egg, drawn 

 from a specimen found on the petiole of a dead stray^berry leaf and 

 loosely placed among the hairs. Identification was made by com- 

 parison with others obtained from the female by dissection. In 

 Woodworth's article, which appeared in 1889, the egg is also described 

 3 



