1875.] 
AMERICAN AG-RICULTURIST. 
305 
and grow rapidly. When full grown, they are 
fat disgusting things like c, bright reddish in 
color, and with two rows of blrck dots along 
the sides. These drop to the groand, enter the 
earth, and in 10 or 12 days come out as the per¬ 
fect insect, d, which goes on and lays eggs to 
keep them in subjection; but many persons 
do not know of their presence until the vines 
are overrun, and hand-picking not possible. 
The only thing then to be done is to use poison 
—Paris Green. Various poisons are offered as 
“ sure cures,” but they can not be any more 
specific name referring to the fact that the 
plant is used as food by the Indians. There 
are two species of Camassia; the one above 
named is found from the Rocky Mountains west¬ 
ward, and the other, called the eastern Quamash, 
C. Fraseri, (Scilia Fraseri, Gray,) occurs from 
provide for another brood. There are three 
broods in the year, though they may be found 
in all stages through the summer; the last 
brood undergoes its changes in the ground, and 
passes the winter there as a perfect beetle, and 
comes out in the spring to begin the w T ork of 
laying eggs as soon as there any vines to work 
upon. The perfect insect and the larvae, or 
grub, both eat. They feed on the tomato and 
egg-plant, as well as on the potato, and these 
vines must be watched. When they come they 
do not travel further east, but send on a depu¬ 
tation ; they come to stay. Those who have 
them once, are likely to have them next year, 
and in future years. It is a serious matter, and 
must be met in a prompt and business-like 
manner. If the beetle—which we should have 
said is named Doryphora decemlineata, or the 
10-lined Spearman—has its way, you will have 
no potatoes. In the western states the insect 
is looked upon as a matter of course, and ac¬ 
cepted as a fixed fact; they conquer it, and 
have potatoes. It startles those who have 
never seen it before with its rapid increase, 
disgusting appearance, and wonderful voracity, 
but it can be conquered. If the insects appear 
in small numbers, they can be kept under by 
hand-picking, and at the same time destroying 
the eggs. This, if properly followed up, will 
effective than Paris Green, which we know all 
about, and as in all other cases, we advise let¬ 
ting all secret remedies alone. There has been 
much said against the use of Paris Green. It 
is dangerous and deadly, and every one should 
know it, but it has been used in all the western 
states for ten years, and no case is yet reported 
of any injury resulting from its poisoning the 
tuber. It is a case of Paris Green—or some 
similar poison—or no potatoes. We know 
(so far as any negative proof can go) that Paris 
Green does not injure the tubers. These secret 
poisons we know nothing about; they are new, 
having started up this spring, and have not, 
like Paris Green, stood the test of years of trial. 
For a full account of the use of Paris Green 
see the Agriculturist for June, p. 226, and ob¬ 
serve all its precautions. Get the pure article, 
use it as there directed, and see to it yourself. 
The Quamash, Bulb and Flower. 
Quamash, as the Indians of the Pacific coast 
call a plant, which is to them an important 
one, is not a very pleasing name, and it sounds 
much better when Latinized into Camassia, as 
it was by Lindley, when he made a new genus, 
and called the plant Camassia esculenta, the 
Ohio to Wisconsin and southwestward. As 
the plants are close relatives, and both have a 
bulb eaten by Indians, the eastern and western 
Quamash have been confused by various writers. 
The western Quamash, C. esculenta, is culti¬ 
vated by European bulb-growers, and is often 
imported by our seedsmen and bulb dealers. 
Though we have tried these imported bulbs for 
several years in succession, we have never suc¬ 
ceeded in getting a satisfactory flower. Hav¬ 
ing long known the plant from herbarium 
specimens, and it being a native, we were par¬ 
ticularly desirous of growing it, but all our at¬ 
tempts with imported bulbs failed, and it was 
only when one of our associates procured some 
bulbs from their native localities that we were 
able to have it in flower. The onion-like bulb 
throws up narrow leaves about a foot long, and 
a flower-stem one to two feet high, bearing nu¬ 
merous light violet-blue flowers an inch or 
more in diameter in a loose raceme, each flower 
having at the base of its stalk a bract. The en¬ 
graving gives the size and shape of the flowers, 
but to save room, only the flower cluster and 
upper parts of the leaves are shown. Mr. Rand 
in his “ Bulb Book ” says it is not hardy; his ex¬ 
perience must have been with imported bulbs, 
which being generally too weak to flower, are 
probably more tender than the native ones, as 
