74 CORN AND GRASS. 



cbrysalids. So far as was noticed the attack only affected Oat- 

 plants, and notably, not Barley-plants. It was noted in one 

 case as a peculiar fact that in "dredge-corn " (i. e., Barley 

 and Oats mixed), the maggot would attack the Oats and leave 

 the Barley. In another instance mention was made of the 

 damage being on Oats drilled about the middle of April, but 

 that the other part of the field, being planted with Barley, did 

 not appear to have been attacked. 



Beside the attack to the young growing plant, great damage 

 was recorded formerly in Sweden from the second or summer 

 brood, the maggots of which fed on the soft grains in the ears 

 of Barley, and thereby caused the light, worthless develop- 

 ment of the Corn, known in Swedish as "frits," whence the 

 name of the fly. 



Up to 1888, in which the attack was very prevalent in 

 Devon and Cornwall, I am not aware of Frit Fly having been 

 present to a seriously injurious amount in Britain, although 

 the presence of the Oscinis vastator, Curtis, which appears, as 

 far as can be made out, to be the same as the O.frit, Linn., was 

 watched, and recorded (in 1844) by John Curtis, in his ' Farm 

 Insects.' In 1881 I was favoured, by Mr. K. H. Meade, of 

 Bradford, with the information that the Oscinis frit had been 

 observed in the autumn of that year in swarms in an out- 

 building, in the lofts of which a lot of newly-threshed Barley 

 bad been stored, which points to the Swedish form of infesta- 

 tion being then present ; but it was not until 1887 (the year 

 preceding its remarkable prevalence) that I was able to watch 

 this attack throughout its course up to development of the fly 

 as a regular field attack. 



Prevention and Piemedy. — Early sowing. In 1889, 

 Prof. W. McCracken, writing from the Eoyal Agricultural 

 College, Cirencester, on August 1st, observed as follows: — 



"The Frit Fly has again been the most plentiful of in- 

 jurious insects, and, as was the case last year, the degree of 

 injury corresponds to the date of sowing. For example, in 

 one field Black Tartarian Oats (the sort most largely grown 

 here) were sown on March 29th, and enjoyed almost complete 

 immunity from attack ; in another field sown on April 29th, 

 over seventy per cent, of the first stems were destroyed. The 

 plants which had their first shoots killed in this way imme- 

 diately commenced tiller, so that the land continued to have 

 a fairly close cover ; but the secondary stems were always 

 puny and unprolific, compared with the original ones. 



" Early sowing, where possible, appears to me to be an 

 obvious preventive, and a dressing of 1 cwt. or so of nitrate 

 of soda to stimulate the crop to pass quickly through that 



