516 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XXXVI. No. 929 



death from the organism which causes the 

 epidemic flaeherie? There are undoubtedly 

 many organisms which might cause the death 

 of a caterpillar and a subsequent limp con- 

 dition. 



I do not wish to dictate or discuss what 

 makes a piece of work scientific or unscien- 

 tific, for that is out of my sphere; but I have 

 previously stated my own incompetency to 

 work on bacteriology in relation to the prob- 

 lem of the epidemic flaeherie." 



The authors state that they have no experi- 

 mental evidence that the disease may be air- 

 borne but do not wish to exclude such a possi- 

 bility. Bolle,* Prowazek" and Wahl" have used 

 methods involving dry infection, working on 

 the flaeherie of either the silk worm, or nun 

 moth or both. All of these investigators have 

 also used dry cultures at least a year old with 

 positive results. This would give some rea- 

 son to believe that dry infection may be pos- 

 sible in the flaeherie of the gypsy moth. Wahl 

 used methods in combating the nun moth, 

 showing that the disease was air-borne. Gla- 

 ser's and Chapman's experiments as given in 

 their table deal only with wet infection and 

 no inferences involving the various phases of 

 dry infection can be legitimately drawn. 

 From my ovm paper of 1911 and later work, 

 as yet unpublished, it is apparently evident 

 that the epidemic flaeherie (very possibly dif- 

 ferent from the disease which Glaser and 

 Chapman induced) is also air-borne. In this 

 disease it is entirely unnecessary to feed the 

 caterpillars with my culture or inoculate in- 

 dividuals with large numbers of Gyrococcus 

 flaccidifex or some organism that is unknown 

 in order to produce an epidemic of flaeherie 



' Reiff, William, ' ' Some Experiments on Flaeh- 

 erie in the Gypsy Moth," Psyche, Vol. XVI., No. 

 5, Boston, 1909. 



* Bolle, J., ' ' Vorlaufige Mitteilungen iiber die 

 Gelbsucht der Seidenraupe, " Atti e Memoire dell' 

 i. r. Society agraria, Gorz, 1894. 



° Prowazek, Dr. S., ' ' Chlamydozoa, ' ' Archiv fiir 

 Protistenlcunde, 10. Band, Jena, 1907. 



° Wahl, Dr. Bruno, ' ' Uber die Polyederkrank- 

 heit der Nonne (Lymantria monacha L.)," Cen- 

 tralblatt fiir das gesamte Forstwesen, Heft 6, 

 Wien, 1911. 



and death. Whatever the organism may be 

 which causes epidemic flaeherie, it is certainly 

 spread with ease and kills young larvae after 

 the first instar, no matter what the weather 

 or food conditions may be. Glaser and 

 Chapman have not considered secondary hosts, 

 other stages of their bacteria or virulent 

 strains. 



Unfortunately the term " flaeherie " is very 

 indefinite, but it has long been suspected that 

 a number of different diseases are included in 

 this term. That disease which expresses it- 

 self as an epidemic of flaeherie may be due to 

 one or a number of organisms or stages of 

 organisms. More work by the bacteriologists 

 will be heartily welcomed. 



William Eeiff 



Forest Hills, Mass. 



a new fly trap 



To THE Editor of Science : In these days of 

 general campaigning against the house fly, it 

 may be of passing interest to the readers of 

 Science to know that we have constructed at 

 this station a fly trap which catches flies in 

 such wholesale numbers that its merits are 

 apparent to any one. So successful have we 

 been that we have ventured to call it " The 

 Minnesota Fly Trap." 



The trap is twenty-four inches long, twelve 

 inches high and eighteen inches across, the 

 material consisting of a very little lumber and 

 wire mosquito screen, costing 41 cents. A 

 good carpenter can make one in one to three 

 hours. 



The director of this station felt the need of 

 locating on the campus some fly traps which 

 would capture flies in large numbers and as a 

 result of his expressing the desire, this trap 

 was constructed. 



We find bread and milk (if more attractive 

 food is not exposed) frequently renewed, to 

 form the best bait. The following record 

 shows how useful this contrivance is. In one 

 day in the dairy barn, it caught 1,700 flies; 

 rear of dining hall, two days, 3,000 flies ; same 

 place, five days, 13,000 flies; same place, one 

 day, 4,200 flies; on the back porch of a dwell- 

 ing house not far from a stable containing a 



