68 INSECTS AFFECTING STORED PRODUCTS. 
GERMINATION OF SEED. 
~ 
The opinion, which was very generally held, that the larvee of bean 
and pea weevils avoid the germ or embryo, and hence do not cause 
serious deterioration of the germinating power of the seed, seems to 
have been more prevalent in Europe in the case of this species than 
it is now, by seedsmen in America, in the case of related weevils. 
GERMINATION TESTS IN EUROPE. 
Having doubts as to the value of infested seed for planting, Mr. 
Theodore Wood performed some experiments in 1885” with seed 
beans infested by the broad-bean weevil. Twenty beans were se- 
lected and sowed under the most favorable conditions for their 
general welfare. At first, growth was strong and vigorous, but when 
the fruiting time approached it was noticed that the blossoms were 
scanty and small and the foliage faded and withered, while in some 
cases plants had died outright without producing a single pod. The 
total production measured by the pods was in direct proportion to 
the amount of infestation, such beans as contained three weevils 
producing less than those which contained two, while those con- 
taining only one weevil produced more pods, as high as 23 being 
counted in one case.4 
Subsequently more detailed experiments conducted by the same 
writer ° with a larger lot of material and with different varieties of 
plants proved that the first experiment was on too small a scale to 
be productive of decisive results. As an instance, Mr. Wood cites 
the case of one plant, the seed of which was tenanted by six weevils, 
which bore no less than nine pods, seven of which reached maturity, 
Among other things, he states that with the five varieties of infested 
plants tested, namely, Carter’s ‘‘Leviathan,’ Carter’s ‘Seville 
Longpod,”’ two other unnamed varieties of ‘Longpod,” and early 
“Mazagan,’’ more than one-fourth of the pods, although large and 
healthy in appearance, proved upon examination to contain only 
withered germs of the beans. The early ‘‘Mazagan,’”’ however, 
proved to be an exception. 
ness which can scarcely be relieved by any other means than the application of various lotions and vigorous 
scratching. Many persons claim that after being attacked by ‘‘chiggers,’’ which usually cause more irri- 
tation than fleas, they finally become immune and are no more troubled. In fact, it may be said that farm 
hands generally are little troubled by these pests. Many people claim that they are never stung or bitten 
by fleas; then again we will mention the case of B, who is poisoned by mosquitoes as badly as by fleas. To 
summarize, immunity is secured by experience and there is considerable idiosyncrasy. Nearly all forms 
of mites which inhabit dwellings and storehouses cause more or less irritation when they become abundant. 
This subject is considered somewhat more at length in- Circular 77 of this bureau, ‘‘ Harvest-Mites or 
Chiggers.’’ 
a A striking feature in connection with the experiment above mentioned was, according to Mr. Wood, ° 
that the plants raised from weeviled seed, with one single exception, altogether escaped the attacks of 
Aphis rumicis, from which scarcely another plant in the same garden was free. From this he inferred that 
the sap of the weakened plants was of too deteriorated a character to satisfy the fastidious taste of the 
*“colliers.”’ 
