H 61 I I JdQ 
The Ohio Naturalist, 
PUBLISHED BY 
The Biological Club of the Ohio State University . 
Volume XII. NOVEMBER, 1911. No. 1. 
TABLE OF CONTENTS. 
Fink and Lantis — Climatic Conditions and Plant Growth in Southwestern Ohio . . 385 
Metcalf— Life-Histories of Syrphidae II 397 
Goetz— Fluctuating Characteristics of Apples... 406 
CLIMATIC CONDITIONS AND PLANT GROWTH IN 
SOUTHWESTERN OHIO IN 1908 AND 1909. 
Bruce Fink and Vernon Lantis. 
The spring of 1908 was cold, wet and backward, and it was 
almost impossible to plant early in fields or gardens. It rained 
or snowed nearly every day in April. The sky cleared before 
noon on the second day of May, and there was no further precip- 
itation of moisture at Oxford, Ohio, where the observations given 
in this paper were made, until the twentieth of June, except two 
showers that barely laid the dust. July second, third and fourth 
gave showers, which altogether wet loose soil down one to two 
inches. Similar showers came on the fourth and fifth of August 
and again on the twelfth and seventeenth of the month, but at 
no time was loose soil wet down more than two inches. A rain 
on the twenty-eighth of September wet down one inch, and another 
like it came during the last week of October. From the middle 
to the last of November, we had several light showers that set 
the grass growing. The soil of cultivated fields was watched for 
three days after each shower or series of showers, and for six 
months, from the second of May to the middle of November, it 
was at no time wet by rain to a depth greater than two inches. 
The total number of light rains during the six months was nine. 
The drought that occurred during these six months was probably 
the most severe and disastrous known in this locality since its 
settlement. 
The precipitation for March and April, 1908, was excessive, 
and the government Monthly Weather Review for both months 
put us in' the area of four to six inches. We were also put in the 
area of four to six inches precipitation for May, 1908; but this is 
very likely an error of compilation from few stations for a large 
area, since so much precipitation probably did not occur before 
*Contributions from the Botanical Laboratory of Miami University. VII. 
385 
