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TURNIP. 
Mr. E. Parsons requested information “respecting a plague of 
grubs from which my farm for some months has been suffering. 
“ They first made their appearance in June last (being then very 
small) in my root-crops, first attacking the leaves, afterwards the roots 
themselves. Some eighty acres were cleared entirely, not even a weed 
being left alive in the fields. Some Rye also was damaged in the 
autumn. 
“I find now that the whole of my fields are infested with them more 
or less; the specimens I send you to-day I found after the plough a 
few days since; they were then in a lively state. ... I find that 
they soon get back again into shelter, after having been turned out 
with the plough.” 
From the reports sent in during 1887, and the three preceding 
years, it appears that this attack is prevalent and destructive in the 
more southerly, eastern, and midland parts of England; but I do not 
find that notes have been sent in of it occurring farther north than 
Selby and Market Weigliton, in Yorkshire, but as for remedies, or 
means of prevention, we seem just as far off as ever. 
Various chemical applications tried in unmixed form have had no 
effect. Col. G. Coussmaker, of Westwood, Guildford, who has for 
some time paid much attention to the grubs, informed me that he 
“put several grubs into bottles of soot, sulphur, salt, but they only 
burrowed straight down, as if wishing to get away from unpleasant 
quarters, and remained coiled up at the bottom of the bottles. After 
letting them alone for tAVO days I took them out seemingly uninjured, 
and have put them into a bottle full of earth. There they have been 
for upwards of three weeks, without a bit of green food, and are to all 
appearance as well and lively as ever.” 
On the 23rd of January in the present year, Col. Coussmaker 
further mentioned, “ I told you that I found the crop dwindling away 
very fast, and that I got a family of Hop-pickers, father, mother and 
three girls, to pick the whole field systematically. They went over 
the seven acres twice, and in sixteen days collected sixteen quarts.” 
[We certainly greatly need some experiments tried about this 
yearly recurring pest, when the only known way of really extirpating 
it is one of such trouble and cost.— Ed.] 
One note was given regarding nitrate of soda having been 
previously used on the land without any immunity from attack 
following, and likewise that the grubs were as plentiful where a good 
deal of lime had been applied as elsewhere. 
Other notes mention some good coming from the use of lime, but 
there does not seem to be any method which can be commonly 
worked at a paying rate, that can be trusted to as a remedy. Where 
it can be done, hand-picking is a certain way of getting rid of a large 
