838 
li&port of the Consulting Entomologist. 
The midge lays its eggs in the flower-heads of the clover, and the 
maggots (which very soon hatch) may be known in a general way 
by their likeness to the " red maggot " of the wheat, but they vary 
in colour from a very pale tint to orange-red. They are about the 
eighth of an inch in length. 
These maggots feed in such numbers on the young clover-seed 
as seriously to injure the yield, and when full-fed (in the regular 
course of things) they leave the heads and go down into the ground, 
or into any sheltering rubbish on the surface, to go through their 
changes ; but some of them may be harvested in the cut clover. In ' 
summer they change to the gnat midge state very soon, but in 
autumn (besides what are harvested in the stack) many remain 
undeveloped to the gnat state until the following spring. These may 
be found in numbers lying near the roots of the clover, but, so far as 
we know, without doing them any harm. 
There may be at least two broods in the season, and the amount 
of harm done obviously depends on whether the dates of flowering 
of the clover and of the appearance of the midge coincide. In the 
instance reported to me, where much harm was being done, near 
Braintree, this was towards the middle of September. It may turn 
out that where the seed crop is taken in July or August this may 
be between the early and late broods, and be safe. 
One very important measure of prevention is examination of 
clover seed. The maggots may easily be transmitted in home-grown 
seed, or in seed imported from America ; and all possible care, both 
on the part of purchasers and sellers of seed, is desirable to insure 
it being clean from these " red maggots." If sown they will merely 
be restored to natural protective circumstances by being buried, and, 
like the seeds, will furnish a new crop in due season. 
Seed may be examined by running a handful on white paper, 
when the maggots will be easily distinguishable. Where the use of 
infested seed is unavoidable, any dressing or steep which is known 
to be safe for use in destroying other insect vermin might certainly 
be expected to destroy this kind of maggot. 
The only other apparently practicable means of checking attack 
n infested districts are mowing the clover for hay before the seed 
has formed sufficiently to allow the maggots to feed to maturity, or 
the still more inconvenient plan of omitting clover- growing for a 
while. 
This infestation has a power of doing so much mischief that 
it would be desirable to watch it. There is also another midge 
attack present in clover, of which as yet I have only secured the 
maggots near the roots in winter. The above seed attack is quite dis- 
tinct from that of the clover-seed weevil maggot, which has long 
been known. 
The stem eel worm (Tylenchus devastatrix), which causes tulip- 
root in oats and stem-sickness in clover, showed itself markedly in 
August in field bean plants near Woburn. The infested bean crop 
succeeded oats. Amongst the plants sent me for examination, one 
in healthy condition was between three and four feet high ; the 
