1846.] Insects Injurious to Vegetation. 261* 



from the fly alone, says the Genesee Farmer, (vol. vii., p. 251,) 

 will doubtless be at least 500,000 bushels. In those districts of 

 Illinois, Wisconsin, and Iowa, which are contiguous to the Missis- 

 sippi river, it appears to have been common, and also in eastern 

 Pennsylvania. From a minute in the proceedings of the trustees 

 of the Maryland Agricultural Society, we learn that " so great 

 ravages have not been committed by the Hessian fly, since 1817. 

 On some of the best land wheat has been plowed up, and other 

 portions are so much injured, that they will not be worth harvest- 

 ing. At least one-half of the crop of Talbot county has been de- 

 stroyed." And in the upper counties of Georgia, it is said, " the 

 fly has committed such ravages upon the wheat, as scarcely to 

 leave enough seed for another year." 



Its JVame and Synonyms. 

 It is a somewhat trite but very true adage, that " names are 

 things," Every one who has had occasion to search through 

 files of our agricultural journals for information respecting any 

 particular insect or other malady to which our crops or herds are 

 subject, well knows what doubt and perplexity is often occasioned 

 from having two or more names used by different writers for the 

 same thing, and also from having two or more distinct things de- 

 signated by the same name. To illustrate this, let us refer to the 

 Patent Office Report for 1844, p. 26, where, in thirteen consecu- 

 tive lines, we read as follows: " Near Onondaga county the wheat 



is said to be injured by the grain worm In Schoharie 



we find complaints of the weevil In Schenectady county 



the ravages of the fly were great In parts of Columbia 



county it suffered from the maggot In Dutchess a yellow 



worm in the head destroyed it," Of a truth, " what a host of 

 enemies!" By way of climax, we only require some wiseacre 

 who has never seen the insect or lived within a hundred miles of 

 it, to say, " Good people, you are all wrong; wheat worms is the 

 correct name for your insect" — and we are furnished with a tole- 

 rably complete list of the popular synonyms of the Cecidomyia 

 tritici ! But who, not intimately conversant with its American 



