﻿164 EIGHTH ANNUAL REPORT 



manifest around Sonoma, and many vineyards there are already 

 seriously affected. Mr. Julius Dresel of that place, who was in my 

 office the past winter, informed me that he has himself had to root up 

 many hundreds of vines, and that the roots are crowded with the lice. 

 There naturally exists much excitement among the grape growers of 

 the Pacific about it. Had the subject not been thought too lightly of 

 and had the California authorities taken some steps to guard against 

 the introduction of the pest when I pointed out the danger in the Fall 

 of 1871 in the Rural Nevt Yorher and Rural Worlds and also in my 

 4th Report (p. 56), the calamity which now seems inevitable to their 

 grape interest might have been averted. Active measures, even at 

 this late day may do much good, but it seems impossible to get our 

 politicians to appreciate the interests of the producing classes. A 

 bill "for the destruction of the Phylloxera" was introduced at the 

 last session of the Legislature which, through indifference, failed to 

 pass; and it is probable that nothing will be done till bitter expe- 

 rience obliges action, by which time it will in all probability be use- 

 less. While the authorities fail to appreciate the situation, the grape- 

 growers are much exercised, and are already endeavoring to profit as 

 much as possible by the researches of others, and the experience of 

 the French. This they will be able to do through the efforts of Prof. 

 E. W. Hilgard, of the University of California, who appreciates the 

 situation and who, in an address, delivered before the State Vinicul- 

 tural Association, at San Francisco last November, gave an excellent 

 resume of the insect's habits and of the best means of managing it. 

 He infers that, from the great local intensity and comparatively slow 

 spread of the disease, the winged females are not developed to the 

 same extent as in France or the Mississippi Valley — an inference 

 which, it is to be hoped, future experience may warrant, but which I 

 fear it will not. 



ITS OCCURRENCE IN THE SOUTHERN STATES. 



While I have shown in previous Reports that the Phylloxera ac- 

 tually occurs in North Carolina and other Southern States, the exam- 

 inations made by Messrs. Berckmans and Ravenel, at Augusta, 

 Ga., and Aiken, S. C, which I reported last year, indicate that it is 

 not found in those localities. In the Proceedings of the 15th Session 

 of the American Pomological Society is a report of a special com- 

 mittee, consisting of A. S. Fuller, of N. J., Messrs. Berckmans and 

 Ravenel, and Thos. Taylor, of Washington, D, C, appointed at the 

 previous meeting of the society upon the follov^'ing resolutions offered 

 by Mr. Berckmans, and which indicate the object of the mover: 



