THE TUBEROUS BEGONIAS. 



23 



portant discovery, nothing less than a new insect. This 

 is an aphis Persiae niger, E. F. Smith, "black 



peach aphis " ) or louse which works both upon the 

 foliage and root of the peach tree. Upon the root it is 

 particularly noxious. The great colonies of insects so 

 dwarf the tree that it may make scarcely any growth 

 for many years. The tree looks yellow and sickly, and 

 it is not strange that such a one should be mistaken for 

 a yellows tree. It is highly probable that the isolated, 

 stunted peach trees which we sometimes see in orchards 

 are attacked by this root louse. It is abundant in the 

 sandy lands in the Chesapeake country, and Dr. Smith 

 has found it in Michigan. A liberal dose of tobacco 

 will kill this insect. I saw some wonderful recoveries of 

 aphis-infested trees from the use of tobacco.* 



Laboratory cultures from diseased trees have given 

 various results. Sometimes no germs are present, and 



sometimes many are found. The disease is far more 

 obscure than pear blight, and results will come slowly. 

 Those who have no intimate knowledge of the difficul- 

 ties of such work can form no idea of the labor and 

 patience involved. 



Michigan, New York and Virginia have definite yel- 

 lows laws, and Delaware has one which applies to the 

 lower half of the state. In many parts of the middle 

 states the orchards are so large and the homesteads so 

 isolated that laws cannot be promptly enforced. But 

 the value of eradication, enforced by law, is illustrated 

 in Michigan, and the absence of it is painfully apparent 

 in this beautiful Chesapeake country. 



A^ew York. L. H. Bailey. 



* Full descriptions of this pest, with remedies, can be found in 

 Entomologica Americana, VI, Nos. 6 and 11, and in Bull. 72, N. J. 

 Exp. Sta. 



Fig. 3. The Besom of Destruction. 



THE TUBEROUS BEGONIAS. 



OPINIONS AND EXPERIENCES CONCERNING ONE OF THE MOST ATTRACTIVE GROUPS OF PLANTS IN 



CULTIVATION. 



Fi'o-. I, Frontispiece . 



New Named Begonias — Upper left hand specimen, American Garden; lower left hand, Fascination ; upper right hand, 



New Rochelle ; lower right hand, Rose Hill. 



rHE tuberous or bulbous rooted begonias 

 are so called from the fact that they 

 have a tuberous root. The tubers in- 

 crease in size every year, and are 

 largely used in the propagation of the plant. 



When these begonias were first introduced, they 

 were esteemed only as a rather expensive novelty. 

 But when cultivated, they have shown themselves 

 to be capable of great improvement in character 

 and habit, and in the size and color of the flower. 

 The species are also easily crossed, and thus an 



endless variety may be obtained. It is not strange, 

 then, that they are so rapidly becoming popular, 

 and one would be safe in predicting that, in the near 

 future, they will be grown more extensively than the 

 now so common geraniums. 



The season of flowering is fully six months long. 

 The first blossoms appear in early spring, and 

 until late in the fall flowers are continuously pro- 

 duced. They are of the richest colors, embracing 

 every shade of white, rose, pink, red, scarlet, 

 crimson, maroon, lake, yellow and orange, and 



