fiESSIAN FLV. 23 



peculiar and injurious Wheat attack, of which the cause was not 

 known, which was then occurring in the neighbourhood of Airaines, in 

 the Department of Somme, in the north of France. On examination 

 I found the specimens to be of stubble of a large-stemmed Wheat, 

 having, in most instances, an unusual number of very thin shoots, 

 from a few inches to a good many inches long, surrounding the base 

 of the plants. In one instance, where the whole plant was sent as a 

 specimen of the complete attack, I found, besides these spindly abor- 

 tive shoots, the ear-bearing stem, — still of a very full green, but with 

 the ear quite abortive, — long, very thin, and vmable to free itself from 

 the sheath, and the joint below much shortened, and round the base 

 of this deep green stem were numbers of the abortive withered 

 spindly shoots. 



This green ear was described by Mons. Eripier as a characteristic 

 of the attack. He observed, " There are some fields where about a 

 third of the ears are quite green still, while two-thirds are ripe. The 

 green ones are of a somewhat longer shape, so that at first sight they 

 look as if they came from seeds of a different variety." Mons. Eripier 

 suggested that this difference was to be ascribed to the retarded growth 

 of the infested plants, — that is, to the injury caused by the larva, — the 

 same being constantly found at the foot of the plants bearing the 

 green ears. 



The appearance of the plants was very peculiar, and at the first 

 glance at the sheathed ear, and at the numerous shoots, suggested 

 rather some form of " Gout " or Chlorops Fly attack above, and " Beg- 

 ging" or Tulip-root below, than Hessian Fly attack. The condition, 

 however, appeared not at all unlike that described by Dr. Lindeman as 

 occurring where the Corn is in bad condition, or where there are 

 at one time such an extraordinary number of the Hessian Fly larvae 

 present that the infested plants die before they have formed their ears 

 or reached their full growth. Dr. Lindeman notes, " I have observed 

 such Eye and Wheat in Southern Russia, where nine stems from one 

 root had perished before forming ears, and only one had reached to 

 carrying an ear, and that of backward growth." * 



On handling the plants sent me, I found that puparia (flax-seeds) 

 of the Hessian Fly dropped from them ; and I carefully examined the 

 remains of the upright stems of stubble for specimens in situ. Here, 

 however, I only found a single specimen, and that, curiously enough, 

 was placed on the stem, below, not above, a knot. I then proceeded 

 to examine the thin, short, or abortive shoots which were so numerous 

 round the base of the stronger stems of some of the Wheat plants, and 



* Die Hessenfliege {Cecidomij ia destructor, Say), in Eussland, von Dr. K. Linde- 

 man, Moscow, 1887. 



