25 



enthusiasm for the study as nothing else can. It is such work as this that will 

 tell for the future of entomological research, that will make entomologists, who 

 will honour alike the fields of pure and applied entomology. But such study 

 ought not and will not stop here. Post-graduates will avail themselves of the 

 opportunities which such laboratories offer. Last winter during our long vaca- 

 tion — ours is an agricultural college and our vacations must needs occur in winter, 

 when farm operations are largely at a standstill — I had ten special students of 

 entomology in my laboratory, one from South Dakota, one from Indiana, one 

 from Ohio, one from Japan, one from Wisconsin, and the others from our own 

 State. Nearly all were college graduates. Six special students, all graduates 

 from colleges, have spent the year in my laboratory in special entomological 

 study as post-graduate students. It seems to me that such are the young men 

 who are going to develop the entomology of our country. They are the young 

 men who can and will do grand work in our colleges and experimental stations. 

 These young men each take up some special family or genus of insects, to which 

 they give the major part of their time and study. They collect in all orders and 

 give special attention to biological work, tracing the life histories of insects, 

 identifying as far as possible the insects they capture and trying to become familiar 

 with entomological literature, so far as they are able. The students are mutually 

 helpful to each other. As the laboratory may be said to be a sort of perpetual 

 Natural History, or more accurately Entomological Society, thus the students 

 become familiar with the general laboratory work, in fact, they each become a 

 factor in some degree in carrying the work forward. Here I will close by ex- 

 plaining briefly the mode of our labaratory work, which difi^ers in some degree 

 from the admirable plan which Prof. Forbes explained at the Washington meet- 

 ing of Economic Entomologists last November. Our labels give in compact space 

 locality, date, accession and species number. The accession number agrees with 

 a number — serial number — in our accession catalogue for the special year. Thus, 

 ac. 400 shows that the insect or insects bearing that label were the 400th col- 

 lected during that season. The sp. number is given as the insect is determined, 

 and is the number of the insect in the catalogue which we use. Thus, sp. 25 is 

 " Cicindela purpurea," as the beetle is numbered 25 in Henshaw's catalogue of 

 Coleoptera. In case the catalogue is not numbered, as is the case with Cresson's 

 list of Hymenoptera, then we number it. We have a column in our accession 

 catalogue for date, collector, person who named the specimen, and also for remarks. 



This last column is wide, and in it we can usually write all necessary informa- 

 tion which we received in the collecting. If we are experimenting with or study- 

 ing the insect, our notes are kept on cards. These are numbered to agree with 

 accession catalogue, and are kept in serial order until we know the species when 

 we add the species number as well. We now index the card and place it in its 

 correct alphabetical position in our card collections. Thus we can very easily 

 find our notes on any specimen, either by accession number or by the name of the 

 species. This plan works well, and, it seems to me, is very economical in respect 

 to time. Of course our students all see this sclieuie and become familiar with 

 its workings. 



HESSIAN FLY, WHEAT-STEM MAGGOT AND OSCINIS. 



Mr. J. Fletcher presented some notes upon injuries caused by the Hessian 

 Fly, the Wheat-stem Maggot and an undetermined species of Oscinis. He said 

 that the note was presented with the object of eliciting further information upon 

 a subject which had proved of great interest to him. During the past season he 

 had endeavoured to determine the number of broods of the Hessian Fly for the 



