47G

ON THE ARABLE LAND

oats, and many farmers accordingly gave tlicir bad wheat totbeir work-horses, and sold their oats.

“ The whole of the injury was not attributable to mildew,but proceeded from the concurrence of two other causes: a'blight in the ear, occasioned by heavy showers of rain, whilethe wheats were in full flower, by which the pollen was wash-ed away, and prevented from fecundating the florets. Thisidea is strengthened by the circumstance of the upper floretsof the ears, and very often the whole of one side of the head,being generally barren. In consequence of a great deal ofthe crop having been lodged by heavy rain at the beginningOf August, the grain produce where impregnated, becamesloomy, or small, shrivelled, and ill filled. Both of these cau-ses are known to injure grain crops materially, in years whenthe mildew has not been noticed.

“ Besides the mildew, blight, and lodging, which by theircombination produced such extensive injury in 1808 , severalfanners observed great numbers of minute maggots amongthe ears of their wheat, every one of which appeared to lodgeamong the florets, and to devour the forming grains in thestate of milk, or while soft. These were compared to thespringing maggots often seen in rotten cheese, but vastlysmaller. These must have been the larvae of some small fly,scarabee, or moth, the multiplication of which had been pe-culiarly favoured by the circumstances of the weather, orwhich had been attracted particularly to the wheat, in conse-quence of its diseased state.

“ No discrimination of soils could be pointed out, asmore or less affected by the disease. It attacked the cropsof wheat on strong as well as on free soils; and the only ob-servable difference was, that high, open, free-aired situations,were comparatively less diseased, while low grounds, muchsheltered by high hedges, hedge-row trees, and plantations,and situations near rivers, were obviously arjd considerablymore materially injured. The near neighbourhood of tjie