Reports to the Board of A griculture. 39 
reported from Castle Eden, Durham, by Mr. It. Burdon, of the Castle, 
and a request sent to the Board of Agriculture for information. Mr. 
Burdon, writing later to me at the British Museum, says : “ I have 
now noticed a large number of trees attacked more or less in the same 
way. It looks like a regular epidemic, as it certainly has not appeared 
in the same way for the last few years. My forester tells me that 
they had the same sort of epidemic on the Tyne, or in Northumber- 
land, some fifty years ago (I think) and lost a lot of fine beeches.” It 
has also been reported to the British Museum from Longwillow Hall, 
Morpeth, from whence the following note was sent : “ At a distance 
the tree looks as if it had been whitewashed ; when it is scraped off, 
the yellow eggs or insects are to be seen. Two trees are covered on 
the E. side of their stems. I remember a beech — not an old tree — in 
Gloucester which was affected in the same way, and died after a 
time. It smells something like the larva of a Goat Moth.” 
This scale insect chiefly attacks the trunk, but may ascend into 
the boughs. The females give rise to larvae in September, and they 
envelop themselves in a white cottony secretion, and then cast off 
their antennae and legs and remain for the rest of their lives devoid of 
such appendages. The adult female is a small orange-yellow sac, 
surrounded by a white mass ; these white patches often unite and 
form large felted masses, beneath which the larvae burrow and develop. 
These scale insects suck out the sap very greedily, and often do much 
harm when present in large numbers. In time they cause the bark 
to peel off the tree and then decay and death may ensue. Large 
numbers of trees are attacked in parts of Surrey ; it is also common 
in Cheshire, Huntingdonshire, and probably occurs in small numbers 
wherever the beech grows in Europe. 
The trees should be sprayed in the summer with strong paraffin 
emulsion twice at an interval of two days. In the winter they should 
be sprayed with caustic alkali wash. 
The method of scrubbing the tree trunks is too laborious if the 
attack is on a large scale, and thorough spraying with warm paraffin 
emulsion is quite effective. 
Mr. Burbidge, of the Botanic Gardens, Dublin, has informed Mr. 
Newstead that the weeping beech, of which there are two kinds, 
grafted on common beech stocks is not affected by this coccus. The 
stock may thus be attacked, but the weeping scion is not. 
This insect is not attacked by birds and very rarely by insect 
parasites, according to Mr. Newstead. 
Should the trees be cut down they should be burnt at once. 
