804 General Notes. [ August, 
f 
As an earnest of better methods we are glad to note the appoint- 
ment of E. L. Scribner as assistant botanist to the Department of 
Agriculture. He has been assigned the care of the cryptogamic 
portion of the herbarium, and will devote most of his time to the 
study of the parasitic fungi, especially those which affect inju- 
riously the field and garden crops. The April number of 
Nuovo Giornale Botanico Italiano contains an exhaustive paper, 
by Danielli, upon the structure of Agave americana. It is illus- 
trated by seven large plates containing eighty-one figures. 
ENTOMOLOGY. 
THE BLACK, WHEAT-STALK ISOSOMA (ISOSOMA NIGRUM, n. sp.}— 
Early last autumn I received from Mr. Wm. Deyo, of Denton, 
Wayne county, Michigan, specimens of wheat straw which con- 
tained from five to sixteen larvæ of a four-winged (hymenopter- 
ous) fly. The portion attacked was usually near a joint, but 
might be anywhere along the internode, and was found above 
every joint, though very rarely above the highest one. The im- 
mediate region of attack was creased and deformed (Fig. 1), 
though not swollen, and was 
Z very hard, so that to cut it, 
: ee except with a very sharp 
Fic. 1.—Black dots show exit of fly. knife, was difficult. At this 
portion of the stalk, which was usually from three centimeters 
(one and a-fifth inch) to five centimeters (two inches) long, the 
straw was not hollow but solid throughout. By cutting into this 
deformed straw the yellowish-white larve were found in oval 
cells. These cells were about four millimeters (.16 of an inch) 
long. I published an account of this fact in several papers of 
Michigan and other States (see Country Gentleman, Vol. 49, P- 
817) asking for further information. In response to these inqui- 
ries I received several communications from Wayne and Wash- 
tenaw counties, Michigan, in both of which the insect worked 
extensively. 
So far as I can learn the insect has never been noticed before ; and 
as the hardened pieces of straw break off in thrashing and come out 
=— = 
Iam indebted for many specimens, says the attack was quite 
general in Washtenaw county, and that the short straws in the 
grain had been noticed and commented upon by many farmers 
who had not even mistrusted that insects had anything to do with 
it, At our Farmers’ Institute held at Plymouth, in January, I 
_ found hardly a farmer who had not been vexed by the small 
pieces of straw, yet not one had discovered the cause. 
Country Gentleman, Vol. 49, p. 857, Professor J. A. 
_ Hintner refers to similar attacks of wheat in New York, and says 
z _ the cause is the same species that has done so much damage in 
