1900] CURRANT GALL MITE. 47 



(possibly the shoots of one or a few years) from the treatment of 

 cutting down infested bushes. And also that when an agent (in this 

 case methylated spirit and water) strong enough to destroy almost 

 (though not quite) all the mites was applied, that it also at once 

 destroyed a third of the plants, and of the rest caused a thoroughly 

 sickly state, apparently fore-running some of them quite perishing. 



This climax, however, I did not wait for, as, having found that the 

 bush stumps brought their tenants with them, I thought no object 

 would be gained by further risk of infestation of my own very good 

 well-bearing bushes, and had the experimental plants which were not 

 removed for scientific inspection dug up and burnt. 



For detailed accounts of results of careful and elaborately conducted 

 scientific experiments in relation to Currant Gall Mite up to date of 

 publication, the reader is referred to the book mentioned below," to 

 which doubtless in due time will be added the results of the Woburn 

 experiments regarding effect of removal of cut-down plants to un- 

 infested ground. 



One point, however, which I take leave to extract from p. 18 

 of the above-mentioned work verbatim, is certainly of importance 

 practically. 



Following on a list of insecticides which have proved valueless, it is 

 mentioned that this includes the two which the Board of Agriculture 

 has recommended growers to adopt as a cure, namely, as mentioned 

 in their Leaflet No. 1, petroleum (paraffin oil) emulsion of the strength 

 of one volume to twenty of water, also a 2 percent, solution of carbolic 

 acid. The strongest solutions used at the Woburn experiments were 

 considerably stronger than those recommended by the Board. " The 

 observations on which these recommendations are based are not quoted, 

 and our own results would lead us to conclude that the adoption of 

 such remedies would entail nothing but expense and disappointment 

 on the grower" (Woburn Report (referred to in note), p. 18). 



For a large amount of minute detail of scientific experiment, of 

 great value to all who are labouring in this difficult field of inquiry, 

 the reader is referred to the above-mentioned Eeport ; but some 

 allusions given in its closing pages regarding the subject of fumigation, 

 to which a good deal of attention was drawn experimentally in the 

 early part of last season, are well worth notice. 



In "Addendum, May, 1900," at pp. 32-34 of the above Report, 

 it is mentioned that a preliminary account of some experiments on 

 the fumigation of infested Black Currants with hydrocyanic acid by 

 H. H. Cousins has recently appeared in the Journal of the South- 



* ' Eeport on the Working and Eesults of the Woburn Experimental Fruit 

 Farm,' by the Duke of Bedford and Spencer A. Pickering, F.E.S., pp. 134. 1900. 

 Eyre & Spottiswoode. Price Five Shillings. 



