314 



•out, and we are pleased to be able to report that we have been willingly supported 

 in our efforts by all dealers handling the stock. 



The State board of horticulture, the State fruit-growers' convention, and the con- 

 vention of county horticultural commissioners, all meet in Los Angeles March 

 10 to 15. These bodies will be made up from the leading horticulturists of the 

 State, men of high intelligence and long experience in horticultural pursuits. From 

 their deliberations and determinations we hope for grand results in furthering the 

 fruit industries of our county and in protecting it after such promotion. 



We have employed the same number of inspectors this month as during the last. 

 They have inspected 857 acres, containing 49,759 trees, and have served thirty-two 

 notices on owners of infected orchards. 



Respectfully, 



A. F. Kercheval, President. 

 F. Edward Gray, Secretary. 



County Horticultural Commissioneri 



EXTRACTS FROM CORRESPONDENCE. 



The Pine Lachnus as a Honey maker. 



I send by this mail a box with pine tags, live Aphids, and honey-dew. I put in a sec- 

 tion of limb, cut sometime ago, where the insects had sucked the bark dry. 



Cutting a limb with the Aphids on, and the leaves covered with honey, I found 

 the next day that they had gone to the cut, where they were fifty deep trying to get 

 at the exuding turpentine. I wish you would send a man, a good chemist and mi- 

 croscopist, to look into this matter. This honey can be seen on the laurel leaves 

 where there are no Aphids. My son, while hunting last week and looking under the 

 pines, noticed that the rays of the sun made visible a tine spray falling from them. 

 Another man told me yesterday he had seen the same. I can show proof that the 

 honey is not a visible exudation from the aphis. I can get you a small vial of this 

 honey gathered drop by drop from the pine leaves. My neighbor has secured 8 small 

 vials full. 



We often have honey-dew in summer, sometimes covering the hickory, gum, oak, 

 chestnut, and poplar leaves, but this is the first winter shower of manna we have ob- 

 served here. It commenced December 20, and ran every day to the 30th ; then Jan- 

 uary 1 to 7, 10, 11, 12, 13, 23, 26, 27, 29(?), 30 (?), 31; February 1, 3, 4, 12, 13, 15, 16, 

 17, 18. 



My eighteen years' observations have proved to me that the atmosphere is nat- 

 ure's storehouse for honey ; my proof and facts I don't think can be overcome. 

 There is so much of this honey on the pines now that my seventy-three colonies of 

 bees can't gather it from them, I estimate 100 pounds of honey on every acre of 

 pines. In the morning it is there like dew in drops as large as peas, but before night 

 it evaporates to thick, ropy honey.— [W. M. Evans, Amherst, Va., February 18, 1890, 

 through the Smithsonian Institution. 



Reply. — The inclosed letter from Mr. W. M. Evans, of Amherst, Va., referring to 

 accession No. 678, is very interesting, and examination of the specimens shows that 

 the plant-louse secreting the honey-dew in such quantities upon the pines is one of 

 the species of the genus Lachnus of which several species are known upon coniferous 

 trees. The specimens are dry and can not be determined specifically The facts 

 which Mr. Evans gives us show that the honey-dew is more abundant than I have 

 ever known it before in the Eastern United States, and his letter is well worthy of 

 publication. I shall therefore take the liberty of publishing it in a near number of 

 Insect Life, a copy of which will be sent to him. — [February 21, 1890.] 



