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the grape-leaf gall-louse, {Pemjyhigus vitifolicc.) This insect is extremely 

 comnioii in Maryland on the ox-eye daisy, and not unfrequently upon the 

 fruit of raspberries and blackberries, and is one of the insects which 

 produce such a disagreeable chinchy taste when taken into the mouth 

 with the fruit. 



Many remedies have been recommended or suggested for the destruc- 

 tion of chinch-bugs, or to drive them away ; among the rest, lime is 

 said by some farmers to have been used with good effect, when dusted 

 over the plants when the insects first appear. Other farmers, however, 

 assert that they have used lime, and have derived no benefit from it. 

 Burning the ground before plowing, or after the infested crops have 

 been removed, has also been recommended, and all the chaff and refuse 

 remaining after winnowing grain ought likewise to be burnt. If small 

 piles of refuse or trash be heaped up here and there in the fields, and, 

 after cold weather sets in and these heaps are dry enough to burn, they 

 are fired on a chilly morning, all the insects sheltering under them will 

 be burned and destroyed, as the chinch-bugs are very apt to take shelter 

 under such heaps from the inclemency of the weather. From other 

 farmers we have received reports as to the efficacy of gas-lime in 

 driving the insects away from growing crops, but they say nothing 

 about the benefit or injury the plants themselves receive from such an. 

 application. 



In a former report, Mr. Laughlin states that although he used lime 

 with no effect whatever, yet " the application of salt to only one acre of 

 wheat, in the proportion of one bushel to the acre, drove all the insects 

 away, and saved the crop on that single acre, while the rest of the ten 

 acres planted was destroyed by the chinch-bugs." Salt, however, when 

 applied too freely, would be very apt to injure the plants themselves. 

 Mr. Laughlin also states that he was satisfied that if he had sown If 

 bushels of rock-salt (not more) to the acre, by the first of June, or ten to 

 fourteen days sooner, he would have saved his whole crop ; and, at the 

 same time, he recommends a spoonful of salt to be put to each hill of 

 maize. Some farmers at the West tried the experiment of sowing Hun- 

 garian grass with wheat and other grains, and state that their crops 

 have been saved by the chinch-bugs preferring the tender grass and 

 leaving the grain uninjured. Open trenches or ditches, dug around the 

 fields overrun with chinch-bugs, have been highly recommended as 

 preventing the migrations of these insects from an infested field to 

 another uninfested field in the immediate vicinity. These trenches 

 should be dug a foot or more in depth, having a sloping side toward the 

 infested field and a perfectly perpendicular side toward the field intended 

 to be protected, so that the insects could readily crawl into the trench 

 from the field already injured, and, not being able to crawl up the per- 

 pendicular side toward the uninjured field, would fall back into the 

 trench, and could be destroyed by lime, or gathered up and destroyed 

 by fire or some other means. It would even be better if the perpen- 

 dicular side of the trench should slope somewhat inward at the bottom, 

 so as to make its upper edge project a few inches over the trench, and 

 then it would be almost impossible for any chinch-bugs to ascend and 

 crawl into the next field. 



Pine or fence boards set lengthwise and close together, or the ends 

 even a little overlapping each other and sunk a little in the earth, so 

 that the bugs cannot creep through the crevices made by the joining of 

 the boards or underneath, and the upper edge of this fence kept moist 

 with coal-tar, will also prevent the migration of the chinch-bug from 

 field to field, as they are unable to cross the tarred line, and fall to the 



