TXJKNIP MUD-BEETLK. 109 



surprised to fiud scarcely any boring in those which had an unhealthy 

 shaw ; I pulled up a few of them to see the roots, they were all right, 

 no fiuger-aud-toe to be seen ; I then brolve away the leaves, and found 

 the enemy under cover close down at the roots of the leaves (or rather 

 where they leave the bulb), and a great many of them in the centre of 

 the shaw, eating up the young growing leaves. In fact, the young 

 leaves never got grown, they were eaten as fast as they grew. I found 

 the maggots of different sizes, I suppose being of different ages, young 

 and old. I found sometimes as many as a dozen in one shaw, some 

 shaws fewer; but I did not find a single Turnip without them among 

 the Beck's Early Yellows. The summer was wet, but they seemed to 

 thrive either in rain or sunshine. 



"This year" (1894, Ed.) " they have remained more in the shaw 

 than the bulb, and the crop is better than last year's crop; it is grown 

 on heavier soil. No second growth of young tender leaves this year ; 

 the first leaves are almost gone, and the bulbs nearly bare ; what are 

 left come away in your hand when pulling. 



"The twenty drills of Aberdeenshire Golden Yellow sown on the 

 7th, two days later, is the best crop on the field; I would say they are 

 a full crop. The whole of the field, with the exception of the Beck's 

 Early Yellow, are a good crop, and free from the pest." — (P. S. C.) 



Mr. Cowie also observed, in the above letter of November, that they 

 are observable much earlier in the season than at the date of writing, 

 and that he thinks they have the infestation more or less every year. 



Looking at the above observations, it does not appear as if moderate 

 difference in date of the first sowings made a difference in attack, as 

 in 1893 those early in June escaped, and in 1894 some of them were 

 infested. Nor does weather appear to have influence, as in 1893 the 

 " season was dry," and in 1894 it is noted that the weather broke, and 

 became wet and rainy to a degree to cause sowing to be delayed. I do 

 not see that anything can be considered proved as to one kind being 

 more subject than another to attack, excepting that both in Mr. Cowie's 

 observations, and in those sent me by Mr. Milne in 1889, I do not 

 find mention of Swedes being injured. 



But with regard to prevention of recurrence of attack, something 

 may, I think, be very usefully gathered from some of Mr. Milne's 

 repeated notes, with which he favoured me in the year above referred 

 to. He mentioned : — " When a field is sown in Turnips alongside 

 one that produced Turnips the year before, not unfrequently a few of 

 the drills Clearest to the field ivhich grew Turnips the year before are 

 destroyed by this insect. 



" I have observed Turnips attacked at the side next a former Turnip- 

 field here and there throughout this part of the country for over 

 thirty years. 



