PHOSPHATES PHYLLOXERA. 



199 



the vicinity. Phoanixville has two national banks, 1 

 daily and 2 weekly newspapers, 10 churches, manu- 

 factures of cotton goods, stockings, pottery, needles, 

 shirts, and boiler-works. The borough was incorpor- 

 ated in 1849. It has gas- and water- works, and is free 

 of debt except the water-loan of $220,000. Electricity 

 is used to light the iron-works. Near the town is a 

 beautiful cemetery containing a monument to the sol- 

 diers who fell in the civil war. 

 PHOSPHATES are the compounds formed by the 

 union of basic bodies with phosphoric 

 SeeVol. XVIII anhydride, P, O s . Of these much the 



4m Reo ) most i m P ortant ' and the on e to which 

 our attention will be confined, is phos- 

 phate of lime, 3 CaOP,O 4 , which forms the prin- 

 cipal constituent of several minerals, especially of 

 APATITE (q. v.), and is the basis of all bones and horns. 

 Phosphorus, indeed, occurs in nature principally in 

 the form of phosphate of lime, from which it is usu- 

 ally derived. Thus combined it appears to be an es- 

 sential element of plant food, concentrating itself par- 

 ticularly in the seeds of plants, whence it enters into 

 the food of animals, to which it is perhaps even more 

 necessary. 



Lime phosphate occurs in many forms in the super- 

 ficial deposits of the earth's surface, and is the basis 

 of most of the artificial fertilizers which are now so 

 largely manufactured, and of the natural manures 

 which are applied without special preparation to the 

 soil. It is, tor instance, an important constituent of 

 guano, whose value depends very largely on the per- 

 centage of lime phosphate which it contains. It also 

 forms a minor constituent of the marls which occur in 

 such abundance in this country, vast deposits existing 

 in New Jersey, and in a broad belt running parallel to 

 the coast from South-east Virginia to the western jimit 

 of Georgia, and thence across Alabama ii/to Missis- 

 sippi. Tlie percentage of phosphates in these marls 

 is small, yet it is sufficient to add considerably to their 

 value as fertilizers. 



Far the most important deposits of phosphates, 

 however, are those which are known as "phosphate 

 rock " which exists abundantly in South Carolina and 

 elsewhere. The marl beds near Charleston, S. C., are 

 overlaid by a stratum of what was formerly supposed 

 to be nodules of limestone, and was thrown aside as 

 useless in the mining of these marls. These "marl 

 stones" were hard, rounded concretions, from the size 

 of a potato to a diameter of several feet, and had evi- 

 dently gained their rounded form by rolling in water. 

 In 1867 Dr. St. Julian Kavenal was induced to ex- 

 amine them, and quickly discovered that they con- 

 tained phosphate of lime to the important extent of 

 5"> t'i 60 per cent. The announcement of this fact was 

 followed by the discovery that, in addition to the 

 known deposits, the rivers near Charleston flowed over 

 beds paved with this rock. So far as has been ascer- 

 tained the beds of phosphate rock underlie an area 70 

 miles in length and 30 miles in greatest width, and are 

 practically inexhaustible as sources of fertilizing ma- 

 terial . The State receives a royalty on all phosphate 

 rock removed from navigable streams, the quantity 

 paid on in 1886 being 191,174 tons. Nearly the whole 

 of tliis river rock is shipped to foreign and domestic 

 ports, the South Carolina phosphate-factories using 

 the land rock almost exclusively. In 1884 there were 

 40 such companies, engaged in crushing the rock into 

 fertilizing material. 



Similar deposits exist in North Carolina, in which 

 State a special survey made in 1884 disclosed nearly 

 150 separate beds of phosphate nodules. These are 

 found in a belt of territory 15 to 20 miles wide, and 

 extending from the N'euse River to the South Carolina 

 boundary. It runs parallel to the coast and from 20 

 to 25 miles inland. Similar rock has also been dis- 

 covered in Florida, occurring in the north-western part 

 of the State, and also near Gainsville, in the central 

 region. In places these beds are 6 to 8 feet thick. 



The phosphates here described are of animal origin, 

 and belong to the early tertiary age of geology. 

 Phosphatic deposits of cretaceous age have been found 

 in Alabama and Mississippi, and taken as a whole the 

 American phosphate-beds promise to be of immense 

 value to agriculture. In addition to the natural phos- 

 phatic fertilizers the manufacture of artificial ones is 

 an industry of considerable importance. For a de- 

 scription of these see FERTILIZERS. (c. M.) 



PHYLLOXERA (Phylloxera vastatrix. Planchon). 

 In 1865 Prof. J. E. Planchon, of Montpellier, France, 

 announced the discovery of the fact that the disease 

 of'Hhe grape-vine, which had attracted much attention 

 in the south of France around the mouth of the Rh6ne, 

 was due to the work of a minute plant-louse on the 

 roots. It had previously been described under three 

 different generic names in its apterous form, but it 

 was properly placed by Planchon in the genus Phyl- 

 loxera and given the specific name of vastatrix. In 

 1854 Dr. Asa Fitch of New York had described an 

 American grape-leaf gall-louse under the name of 

 Pemphigus vitifolice, and in 1869 M. J. Lichtenstein 

 of Montpellier,_ France, suggested that this species 

 might be identical with P. vastatrix. Acting upon 

 this suggestion, Prof. C. V. Riley, then State Ento- 

 mologist of Missouri, in 1870 established the identity 

 of the two insects, and in 1871 proved the existence 

 of the root-inhabiting form in this country, announc- 

 ing, in the Fourth Missouri Entomological Report, that 

 there is every reason to believe that the failure of the 

 European vine in this country and the partial failure 

 of the hybrids of our vines with the European, as 

 well as the deterioration of the tenderer native va- 

 rieties, are chiefly due to the work of this insect. Prof. 

 Riley's conclusions as to the identity of the American 

 and European insects were proven correct the same 

 year by European observers, and were again confirmed 

 by Prof. Planchon in 1873 when he visited this country 

 under a commission from the French government. 

 The most important result of his visit was the dissipa- 

 tion, to a great extent, of the prejudice existing against 

 the American vine in France and the confirmation in 

 his official report of all the more important facts and 

 conclusions previously announced by Prof. Riley, es- 

 pecially as to the resisting power of many of the native 

 American vines. A standing reward of 300,000 francs 

 offered by the French government for an efficient rem- 

 edy has stimulated an enormous amount of experi- 

 ment in that direction. Journals were founded devoted 

 to this one subject, and an extensive literature on the 

 subject has grown up since 1869. 



The native home of the Grape Phylloxera is the 

 North American continent east of the Rocky Moun- 

 tains, and extends from the Gujf of Mexico to Canada. 

 From this region it has been introduced into Europe 

 and, recently, into California. It exists in two forms, 

 the one in galls on the leaves called by Riley galli- 

 cola and the other on the roots radicicola. In the 

 gall-making form the species exists only as an agamous, 

 apterous and very prolific female, with a smooth skin. 

 The galls are transient, and may be abundant one year 

 and very scarce the ensuing ysar on one and the same 

 vine. The root form closely resembles the gall-makjng 

 individual at birth, but deviates later by acquiring 

 tubercles (see illustration). The insect passes the 

 winter in the so-called " winter-egg" state, either 

 above or below ground, or it hibernates as a young 

 larva, darkened in color and flattened in form, on the 

 roots, where it can scarcely be distinguished. In the 

 following spring the winter-egg gives birth to a wing- 

 less, agamic female, which Riley calls the stem- 

 mother," and which may start a colony either in a 

 gall on the leaves or on the roots, the former being the 

 more common habit. Late in summer there is pro- 

 duced from the root-feeding form a generation of 

 winged agamic females, which fly abroad and spread the 

 species. Each of these winged females lays from 3 to 8 

 delicate eggs, most often in or on the ground at the base 



