164 Trap Lanterns or Insect Catchers, [june, 



which is notoriously injurious to cultivated crops, forest or other 

 trees, or the eggs, pupae, or larvae of any such insect. The trans- 

 mission of insect pests by post is strictly prohibited. Special 

 regulations will be made for the transmission of insects for 

 scientific purposes. 



Dr. W. Remer describes in the Jahresbericht der Schles. Gesell- 



schaft fur vaterl. Kultur, 1904, his experiments with traps for 



catching noxious insects injurious to farm 



Trap Lanterns anc j f ru i t crops. Such insect traps have 

 OP 



Insect Catchers t> een recommended on the Continent as a 

 means of combating insect pests. The 

 results of recent investigation, however, tend to disprove their 

 usefulness. In 1902 Dr. Remer chose a trap lantern of the 

 cheapest make, in order to test their efficiency, and to ascertain 

 the cost of using them. Round an ordinary paraffin lamp a 

 tank filled with sugar-water was fixed, but the insects caught 

 were in too bad a state of preservation to enable them to 

 be identified. A lamp with a reflector was then used, and 

 the tank filled with cyanide of potassium instead of a liquid 

 solution. The only advantage from this alteration was in the 

 better preservation of the insects caught. The experiments 

 showed that a considerable waste of time as well as expense 

 was involved, and the " catch " was most unsatisfactory, con- 

 sisting for the most part of indifferent insects, the remainder 

 being useful ones, whilst not a single noxious insect was 

 obtained. Before starting on the experiment the presence of 

 plenty of noxious insects in the neighbourhood was ascer- 

 tained. Slingerland, in " Trap Lanterns or Moth Catchers " 

 ("Cornell Univ. Agric. Exp. Stat. Bull, 1902,") refers to experi- 

 ments undertaken in 1889 and 1892, with the result that 77 per 

 cent, indifferent, 12*6 percent, noxious, and 104. per cent, useful 

 insects were caught. Even here the advantage of the trap 

 was outweighed by the cost of using the apparatus and by the 

 nearly equal proportion of useful insects caught. Much more 

 unsatisfactory are the records of Ribage {Boll. di. Entom. 

 agrar. e Patol. vegelale, Padova, 1904), who experimented during 



