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examine the premises and decide for himself as to the efficiency of the work. At 
other times such is aot the ease, and he may not even Bee the held; yet. very satisfac- 
tory reports come regarding the results obtained, or believed t<> be obtained. The 
reliability of these reports, in our experience, depends very much upon the individual 
making the observations, and especially upon his familiarity with the insect he is 
attempting to control. The trouble with such observers is that they are very apt to 
attribute any improved condition of the plant to the application and to accept an 
apparent decrease in the numbers of the pest as actual proof of the efficacy of the 
insecticide, whereas, such may not be the case at all. An incident of this character 
came to our attention the past summer where several parties had sprayed for Fidia 
viticida Walsh (the grapevine root worm), and thought they had obtained most 
excellent results due to the fact that the vines made Letter growth and that the poison 
protected the leaves to a greater or less extent. An examination, however, showed 
that the protection was more apparent than real, and as this is by no means an 
isolated case it follows that a great deal of caution should he exercised in accepting 
the judgment of iintrained observers. I >n the contrary, our observations on the 
grapeberry moth accorded exactly with those of an untrained observer, and in this 
instance there was hardly room for error, because there was an opportunity to com- 
pare sprayed and unsprayed vines in several plats side by side. We would unhesi- 
tatingly accept the judgment of a growerin such a case, whereas, in the more difficult 
one of estimating the value accruing from arsenical poisons in attempting to control 
the grapevine root worm we much prefer to investigate for ourselves. 
The outdoor cage, as a general thing, is not entirely satisfactory, and yet it is a 
device which we believe can be adopted with benefit in cases where ordinary out- 
door experiments fail to give the results they should in comparison with laboratory 
work. One can never tell just what will he possihle in these outdoor cages. We 
were able last summer in our Fidia work to get definite data on the destruction of 
pupa- and the dates when beetles appeared; yet the insects, in spite of the fact that 
they were in quite roomy cages, 6 feet high, 6 feet broad, and 8 feet to 16 feet long, 
almost refused to 1 treed and, as a consequence, final determinations of the efficacy 
of different poisons and the value of the check cage, as illustrating the destructive 
possibilities of the beetles emerging from under the vines therein, were impossible, 
though beetles of this species, as stated previously, were very amenable to treatment 
in the much smaller jelly tumblers, and we were therefore somewhat surprised at the 
results. On this account we are inclined to restrict the use of large outdoor breed- 
ing cages to more difficult cases where it is necessary to go to considerable trouble in 
obtaining satisfactory results. 
Record Devices. 
Office traditions have gotten us into the habit of making many records, particu- 
larly of species which are contributed by various correspondents, and for this pur- 
pose we have found nothing more satisfactory than a little card about the size of the 
old postal card, with blanks for the scientific name, the common name, the stage, 
the food plant, date of sending, name of sender, locality, and a space for inserting 
the name of any other party or institution through which the specimen may have 
been sent. There is also a blank space for noting any additional data, and spaces 
for the catalogue number, the name of the party by whom the specimen was deter- 
mined, the accession number, and the field book number. Both catalogue and 
field book number are prefixed by letters so they can not be confused with acces- 
sion numbers. The former is convenient because the number given the species is 
that of some well recognized catalogue, and affords a ready means of arranging the 
cards in their proper order. It is also very convenient when consulting one of these 
cards to know who determined the specimens. We have a system of recording 
scale insects in the order of their reception and each sending is given an accession 
number which always appears upon this card and enables an instant reference to the 
original record. We have also a small book called the field book, which is usually 
carried into the field and brief observations recorded therein regarding captures. 
This field book is numbered, and besides the name of the insect it gives also, if possi- 
ble, the name of the food plant. The placing of the field-book number upon these 
cards aids greatly in referring to the original record. To each of the more important 
orders is assigned a letter, which always precedes the catalogue number, and as this 
designation appears upon every card there should be no confusion regarding their 
use. The idea of employing ordinal abbreviations and catalogue numbers is to facili- 
tate the ready arrangement of the cards by comparatively unskilled labor. These 
little slips have been in use in our office for some three years and are much superior, 
in our judgment, to the old record book, since they can be readily rearranged in 
almost any way, entered properly, and it would even be possible to have the printer 
set directly from them, though we have always sent typewritten copy. 
