MaskELL.— Note on an Aphidian Insect. 15 
pass through alternate periods of illness and apparent health, and never be 
really what they should be. At present we only know, as it were, the first 
stages of the malady. 
I find no particular mention anywhere of permanent deadly injury done . 
by Chermes in England ; but we cannot judge with certainty from the ex- 
perience at Home what might be the effects of such a parasite in a climate 
like ours. 
As regards the methods of destroying this pest, it is not easy to suggest 
any certain way, on account of the mechanical difficulty of getting at the 
insect on branches of pine trees, covered so closely as they are with leaf 
tufts. But, as the Homoptera all act in the same way, by sucking through 
the sets of their rostra the juices of the plants they live on, I see no reason 
why remedies already found useful as against the Coccidw should not be 
efficacious against such an aphidian as our present insect. A great 
number of experiments have been made in various countries with a view to 
destroy Coccidæ. Some of these, which are applicable to deciduous orchard 
trees, where the insect is easily approached as it lies on the bark (such, for 
example, as the different oil mixtures, kerosene, etc.), are not available in 
the present instance; and, probably, the only way to attack our aphis 
would be by spraying over the tree some liquid remedy. There are con- 
stantly advertised in the newspapers compounds called “ Scaly blight- 
destroyers,” and the manufacturers of these claim for them all sorts of 
virtues. I believe, however, that in the majority of these the chief reliance 
is placed upon such substances as sulphur, earbolie acid, etc., which are of 
no real use. Sulphur, indeed, is an excellent remedy for such diseases as 
oidium in vines, which are fungoid ; but it seems to have no sort of efficacy 
as against homopterous insects. Tobacco is, in itself, most useful; but 
probably the cost in this country would be too great. But of all remedies 
the best, according to the experience of American observers, appears to be 
common soap. I find from Professor Comstock that a solution of a quarter 
of a pound of soap to a gallon of water has been found to be of very great 
efficacy in destroying Coccide of all kinds, both on deciduous and evergreen 
trees, on the bark and on the leaves. This being so, probably it would be 
also very useful against the pine insect, and is well worth trying. 
course any common soap would do if the solution is made strong enough. 
In some papers lately forwarded to the New Zealand Government by 
the Colonial Office in London, I find a suggestion by a French gentleman 
for destroying Phylloxera vastatrix (also a homopterous insect) by driving 
copper nails into the wood of the infested vines. The idea seems to be 
that the insects would imbibe some salts of copper, and so be poisoned. 
Whether such a course would answer with pine trees and their aphidian 
pest I cannot say, 
