OBSEEVATIONS IN SCOTLAND. 119 



Observations of contributors, arranrjcd under headings of localities. 



SCOTLAND. 



I have preceded the other observations by the following com- 

 munication with which I was favoured by my valued contributor for 

 many years, Mr. Malcolm Dunn, The Gardens, Dalkeith Palace, 

 Dalkeith, N.B., because, besides the record of special appearances, 

 they draw attention in some degree to the reasons influencing amount 

 of Wasp attack. Mr. Malcolm Dunn notes, from his own personal 

 observations during a long course of years, and at localities respectively 

 in England, Scotland, and Ireland, the preference of Wasps for dry 

 situations, and dry soils ; also mentions the special districts of attack 

 during the past season in Scotland, and of the enormous amount of 

 Wasp pi'esence observed by himself during a part of August in various 

 of the southerly and easterly counties of England ; and also notes 

 some applications serviceable for destroying the nests, including cyanide 

 of potassium as the most effective remedy known, but requiring great 

 care in use, it being a rank poison. 



Mr. M. Dunn wrote me on the 28th of September as follows : — 

 "Wasps. — They have been an unmitigated nuisance in many parts 

 of the country this season, but as a rule they prevail most in the drier 

 parts of the country, and on warm and well-drained soils ; hence in 

 my six years' experience in Ireland, I never knew of them being nearly 

 so plentiful as in the drier parts of England and Scotland. 



"I was in the Co. Wicklow in the hot and dry seasons of 1869, 

 1870, and 1871, and although it is about the driest part of Ireland, 

 and on a limestone gravel sub-soil, the Wasps were never half the 

 trouble to us that they were in the Tame Valley, in Worcestershire, 

 where I lived for nearly four years before going to Ireland. Coming 

 to Dalkeith in the warm summer of 1871, I found the Wasps literally 

 swarming here, although, as mentioned above, they were not trouble- 

 some in Co. Wicklow. 



" We had enough of them here this season ; but still I have seen 

 them very much worse in previous years ; and speaking generally for 

 the Lothians, we have had no great cause for complaint, and escaped 

 with comparatively little damage to our fruit. 



" In some parts of Scotland they were undoubtedly bad, particularly 

 round the shores of the Moray Firth, a district that shares with the 

 Lothians in being the driest parts of Scotland. I heard more com- 

 plaints from that district than from all the rest of Scotland, and I think 

 Mr. Charles Webster, The Gardens, Gordon Castle, Fochabers, N.B., 

 would be able to furnish you with some notes on the severe attack the 

 Wasps made on the fruit in that district. 



"I was in the south of England for a fortnight last month, and in 



