The tarnished plant bug must be added to the list of insect enemies of celery. A recent letter from an extensive gardener and fruitgrower in Kansas informs me that unless he can find some effective remedy for this pest he will have to give up growing celery. The bugs appear on the plants by the thousands, and by sucking the sap from the leaves ruin them.

This insect is a very common and widely distributed species. The adult, represented greatly magnified in the accompanying figure, is about one-fifth of an inch long, yellowish-brown or greenish-yellow in color, with five whitish lines just back of the head. It is one of the true bugs, obtaining its food through a beak with which it punctures a great variety of plants. It is often especially destructive to pear and apple blossoms, strawberries, potatoes, cabbage, and numerous other fruits and vegetables.

When practicable, one of the surest ways of destroying these tarnished plant bugs is to shake them off the infested plants early in the morning, while they are yet sluggish from the cold, into a vessel containing a film of kerosene. This is a sure cure for those that are caught. Pyrethrum, or buhach, provided always it is fresh and unadulterated, is probably as good a topical application as can be made. Kerosene emulsion is also generally recommended, but my Kansas correspondent says it.