In a previous paper (1934) it was shown that the life-cycle of S. trachea proceeds best when an intermediate host is involved. By means of Eisenia foetida, an annulate worm, it was possible to induce heavy and certain infestations of gapeworm in chickens with material obtained from the partridge, pheasant, rook and chicken. Other earthworms were shown to be possible intermediate hosts but this was found to be the best and most successful.

1. Examinations for helminths have been made on 380 English partridges (Perdix perdix), 6 Red Leg partridges (Alectoris rufa), 12 pheasants (Phasianus colchicus), 3 quails (Coturnix coturnix) and 7 grouse (Lagopus scoticus).

2. From Perdix perdix 6 species of nematodes and 9 cestodes were recovered. Seven of these, C. retusa, D. proglottina, H. carioca, H. anatina, H. phasianina, R. echinobothrida and R. tetragona are recorded for the first time from this host.

3. From Alectoris rufa were obtained 4 species of helminths, none of which had been recorded from it before. They are T. tenuis, S. trachea, H. gallinae and H. phasianina.

4. From Phasianus colchicus 3 species were obtained. They were all nematodes. From Lagopus scoticus, 2 species of cestodes and one nematode, all of which had been found in these hosts before.

5. A new cestode infestation, Metroliasthes lucida, was noted in the quail (Coturnix coturnix).

1. Laboratory experiments have shown that solutions of ferric chloride, ferrous sulphate and chinosol, in sufficient concentration, have a lethal action on the larvae of H. schachtii. The vapours given off by potassium ethyl xanthate were also found to be lethal.

2. Each of these four chemicals was mixed with moist infected soil and the mixture left for a period. When the cysts were separated and placed in a solution of potato-root excretion, the numbers of larvae which hatched were reduced as a result of the chemical treatments, in the order: potassium ethyl xanthate, ferric chloride, chinosol, ferrous sulphate.

3. When ferric oxide was placed in a solution of root excretion containing cysts, the commencement of hatching was delayed.

4. Experiments on a very small field scale were carried out, the chemicals being applied chiefly to the rows in which potatoes were planted. The plants growing on the treated areas did not, in general, show marked symptoms of root-eelworm infection as did those on the control areas.

5. The yields of potatoes from each row are tabulated. The highest yields were obtained following the treatment with ferric oxide.

In 1928 a description of the morphology of three strains of Heterodera schachtii attacking beet, oats and potatoes respectively, was published in the Journal of Helminthology by the present writer. This was followed in 1929 by a second publication in which the morphology of strains of the nematode attacking beet, oats, hops, mangolds and potatoes were described. In the earlier paper it was noted that cysts of the potato-strain in Hertfordshire were smaller both in average and maximum dimensions than were cysts in soil from South Lincolnshire. The Hertfordshire land had been infected by the addition of South Lincolnshire soil and the reduction in cyst-size occurred in adjacent portions of the plot to which the infection had spread during the cultivation of two successive potato crops. It was concluded that this decrease in size was a reaction to the difference in soil type, possibly associated with available oxygen.

From morphological, biological and experimental data it is concluded that the attempt to merge Necator suillus in the synonymy of N. americanus is utterly unjustified.

In a note in the British Medical Journal for February 3rd, 1934, there is mention of the anthelmintic action of garlic oil. One paragraph says that good results have been obtained in the treatment of threadworm in children while a second is more specific and quotes the case of a woman who was cured of Ascaris lumbricoides in 36 hours. She passed a male, 13¾ inches long, a female and a bunch of newly hatched young.

During the course of experimental work on the factors governing the escape of larvae from the cysts of Heterodera schachtii, a preliminary series of experiments was carried out to determine whether the admixture of artificial fertilisers with infected soil modified in any way the rate of hatching of the larvae. It was thought possible, firstly, that some form of fertiliser might have a lethal effect on the cyst contents or on the larvae during their passage through the soil before they succeeded in entering the roots of the host; secondly, that the fertiliser or its break-down products in soil might neutralise or retard the action of potato-root excretion, which normally stimulates the larvae to escape from the cysts and attracts them towards the roots of the plant; or thirdly, that the larvae might be stimulated to hatch to some extent even in the absence of the host-plant.

The history of the beet-strain of Heterodera schachtii in Germany, where it was first recognized in 1859, and its subsequent discovery in other beet-growing European countries and the United States of America, have already been described in some detail in a Memorandum published by the Imperial Bureau of Agricultural Parasitology. This Memorandum was published in 1931 with the object of emphasizing the potential danger of Heterodera schachtii to the sugar-beet industry, then comparatively newly established in Britain. Observations carried out in America are quoted, which strongly indicated that the eelworm was introduced into the United States by the use of seed imported from European countries where the infection was known to be intense and of long standing; this contention, however, does not yet appear to have been decisively proved. The danger of repeated beet cultivation, without regard to rotation of crops, was particularly emphasized with reference to the wide distribution of the potato-strain of H. schachtii in Britain, and such infections as were already known to occur on other host-plants were noted.

It is a recognised fact that the potato-strain of the eelworm Heterodera schachtii is distributed from district to district by the agency of cysts embedded in soil adherent to seed tubers. The need for some method of freeing seed tubers from viable eelworm, and the extent to which infection may be carried by seed grown in eelworm infested land, are strikingly illustrated by observations carried out by the staff of the Ormskirk Potato Testing Station, which, by permission of the Director of the National Institute of Agricultural Botany, are quoted here.

A Previous paper by Carroll in 1933 described the results of research on the potato eelworm in the Irish Free State up to the year 1932. The table on p. 145 of that paper sets forth the four series of pot experiments which were carried out in 1932 and shows the degree to which the various pots in the different series were artificially infected (before planting) with eelworm cysts for the purpose of the experiments. In assessing the degree of potato sickness which developed in these pots and outlining the results of the experiments, reference was made to the following points:—appearance and size of the overground parts of the plants; degree of development and nature of the root system; presence or absence of different fungus diseases; abundance of eelworm cysts on the roots (as far as could be judged by a visual examination); weight of tubers produced. Before the paper went to press, the actual cyst content of the soil in the different pots at the end of the growing season had not been determined. That has since been done and the figures are presented in Table I on the following page.

Three eelworm-infested samples of a liquor used for tanning hides were recently forwarded to Prof. R. T. Leiper by Dr. D. Jordan Lloyd, Director of Research to the British Leather Manufacturers' Research Association. I am indebted to Prof. Leiper who identified the worm as Turbatrix aceti for the opportunity of examining and reporting upon this material.

For many years past, Syngamus has been recognised as a serious trouble in both avian and mammalian hosts, and the course of the disease has been closely followed in several birds of economic importance. The symptoms are well known and have often been cited. Clinically the first symptom to appear is a characteristic sneezing and coughing in the affected bird. This is followed later by the best known symptom—the actual gaping—when the bird stretches its neck and opens its beak widely in its endeavour to ease respiration. There are minor signs such as a general debility with ruffled feathers but these are secondary and not specific to this disease. Internally in the trachea there is an increase in the secretion of mucus, which coupled with the presence of the gapeworms is sufficient to cause asphyxiation and the bird dies.

In a previous paper the writer (1929) has given an account of the initiation and earlier work on a field plot experiment at Winches Farm devoted to the study of the stem eelworm, Anguillulina dipsaci, in its attacks on potato tubers. For the trials carried out in 1928 the original plot, which was 200 ft. long by about 21 ft. 9 ins. wide, was divided up into 30 smaller plots, each measuring 12 ft. long by 10 ft. 9 ins. wide, and 10 varieties of potatoes were tested, each variety being grown in triplicate. Following an inoculation of the soil with diseased tubers, it was found that all the varieties grown, whether earlies, second-earlies or main-crops, became infected. Since 1928 the plot has been cropped each year with potatoes and the purpose of the present paper is to put on record observations made and results obtained in subsequent years and to advance certain conclusions arrived at as a result of this work.

Early in June, 1933, the writer received two vials of caterpillars, to which nematodes were attached, from Mr. A. M. Adamson of the Pacific Entomological Survey with a request, supported by Mr. E. P. Mumford, the Director of the Survey, that an examination and identification of the helminths would be much appreciated.

During a study of the nematode, Howardula phyllotretae Oldham, 1933, parasitic in Flea Beetles of the genus Phyllotreta, records were kept in order to get data concerning the incidence of infection. The records already published, with a description of the parasite (Oldham, 1933), refer solely to the observations made during 1931. During the two subsequent years large numbers of beetles belonging to the following species: P. atra, P. cruciferae, P. nigripes, P. undulata and P. vittula, were collected and examined for parasites. Collections were made, in each year, from about the beginning of April, when the adults started to emerge from their winter shelters, up to the end of September, when the beetles became scarce and were leaving the plants to hibernate. The observations made, therefore, cover the entire period of the insect's active life.

Mr. L. Ogilvie, Mycologist, of the Research Station, Long Ashton, Bristol, recently sent the writer some bulbs of Lilium longiflorum Thunb., var. takesima, requesting an opinion on the eelworms occurring in the brownish tips of some of the scales. These turned out to be chiefly a species of Rhabditis and Diplogaster nudicapitatus Steiner. There was one thoroughly decomposed bulb scale, dark brown in colour and of a soft consistency throughout which, on teasing in water, was found to contain several insect larvae, mites and numerous nematodes including specimens of Diplogaster longicauda and D. striatus. In addition, about 25 adults of each sex of a new genus of nematode were found which, though somewhat resembling Rhabditis in buccal and oesophageal characters, differed from that genus in certain important features the most outstanding of which was the short buccal cavity. On this character the generic name has been based and because the worms were found in a thoroughly decayed organic medium a specific name has been chosen which denotes their probable feeding habits. Mr. Ogilvie has informed the writer that the bulbs were from stocks imported from Japan. Such bulbs arrive in this country in cases packed with Japanese soil but as the bulbs examined had already been planted in English soil it is impossible to determine from the material available whether the newly discovered nematodes were originally inhabitants of Japanese or English soil.

1. The second ecdysis of infective nematode larvae readily occurs in watery infusions of chopped up garlic bulbs and the cast sheaths are dissolved after the larvae have left them. No particular change in the sheaths was observed before the ecdyses occurred.

2. Ecdyses also occurred readily in 1% sodium sulphide in distilled water, the sheaths being, however, remarkably distended and thinned before the ecdysis occurred.

3. In 0·1% solutions of cystein hydrochloride ecdyses occurred with changes in the sheath similar to those recorded by the writer in mixtures of HCl and NaOH and leading to detachment of a cap, but with little distension or thinning of the sheaths. The cast sheaths were usually not dissolved. Similar ecdyses occurred in 1% sodium taurocholate and 1% saccharin in distilled water, but the former of these two solutions seemed more toxic to the larvae than either saccharin or cystein hydrochloride.

4. Some ecdyses occurred in 0·2% sulphonal with detachment of a cap and some osmotic distension and thinning of the sheaths. The empty sheaths were all slowly dissolved in the medium.

5. In 1% sodium thiosulphate a few ecdyses occurred with some thinning and distension of the sheaths, but the larvae were usually shrunken and often died quickly.

6. The solutions here described could be used for artificial production of ecdyses, 1% sodium sulphide being probably the best for this purpose; but none are so useful as the 1 in 20 dilution of Milton hypochlorite used by the writer (1933 b), because this also sterilises the exsheathed larvae and the medium in which they exsheath.

Early in 1934 the writer received from Prof. Mario Curzi of Rome an agar tube culture on which were growing, in addition to bacteria and a fungus belonging to the genus Fusarium, a number of nematodes which Prof. Curzi wished to have identified. The majority of the nematodes proved to belong to the genus Cylindrogaster whilst the others were found to be Aphelenchus avenae Bast.

In April 1934 Mr. W. E. H. Hodson, Advisory Entomologist, Reading University, sent the writer a portion of narcissus bulb exhibiting disease symptoms. The bulb was a trumpet daffodil, of the variety “Sir Watkin,” from a stock which had been growing in the Isles of Scilly for 40 years or more and had probably never been hot-water treated. It contained a number of nematodes belonging to the genus Aphelenchoides which differed in certain anatomical features from other members of this genus. Good specimens of the worm were not very numerous or favourable for detailed investigation but some measurements and drawings were made at the time and it was hoped that at a later date further and better supplies of the organism would become available. In July 1934 the same species of nematode was found in a portion of diseased narcissus bulb sent to the writer by Mr. L. N. Staniland, Advisory Entomologist, Seale-Hayne Agricultural College, Newton Abbot, when the same peculiarities of structure and appearance were again noted and found to be constant.