WHEAT-BULB FLY. 



37 



The second observation gives some remarks on rolling, and also on 

 there being possibly some confusion between effects of maggot and of 

 frost on the young plant ; and this point is also alluded to in the com- 

 munication by Mr. E. A. Fitch, given below. 



Mr. Parlour observed: — " With regard to your second question, it 

 is not usual to roll land in autumn, and I have never known an 

 instance of it ; but, rather strangely, I find on enquiries that it was 

 the universal custom fifty years ago to roll fallow land in the autumn, 

 after it was sown with Wheat. The reason given for this custom was 

 that it prevented the Wheat from being ' turned out ' by the frost. Now 

 as to this ' turning out : ' I have visited many fields that were said to 

 have been ' turned out,' but 1 found in every instance that it was the 

 maggot, and not the frost, that had done the damage. I do not say 

 there is no turning out because of frost, but there is not nearly so 

 much as is generally ascribed to it. Is the foregoing sufiiciently con- 

 nected to enable us to come to the conclusion that the pest was in 

 existence fifty years ago, and rolling in the autumn was resorted to, to 

 prevent it ? Scarcely, perhaps ; it would be going too fast ; but it is 

 as well to keep this in mind for a time." 



The following notes, from Mr. E. A. Fitch, of the Brick House, 

 Maldon, Essex, refer to various of the foregoing points, and are of some 

 special interest regarding technical insect observation, as, besides being 

 an agriculturist on a large scale, Mr. Fitch is an entomologist of old 

 standing, and was at one time Secretary of the Entomological Society. 

 Mr. Fitch wrote me on the 9th of June : — " This white maggot has 

 been very troublesome on our Essex heavy land this year, and much 

 that has been said to be winter-killed has, I believe, really suft'ered 

 from this pest. Mr. Frank Page had twenty acres of Tare-etch Wheat ; 

 the Tares had been fed off, and where the field was first folded, and 

 consequently first ploughed and longest fallowed, the attack was very 

 bad, and in less intensity over the field, until the side sown with spring 

 Tares, and only ploughed for Wheat once, not fallowed at all, was 

 hardly touched. The rest had eventually all to be ploughed up, and 

 in the earliest ploughed (last year) land hardly a blade was left. This 

 is interesting, and looks as if the tilth of the land had something to do 

 with it ; it is always worst on fallow or Tare-etch Wheats than on 

 Wheat after Beans, Peas, or Clover. I have enquired, and there are no 

 changes in rolling practice ; we have never rolled our Wheats except in 

 spring, or, for the matter of that, any other land." 



Summary. — Looking now over the notes of the past season, in con- 

 nection with those of previous years, it seems to me that though we 

 have not advanced to certain knowledge (that is, knowledge from 

 absolute observation of the maggot itself in the ground) of where the 



