Morris studied the habits of wheat flies that resembled the Hessian fly, concluding that the eggs were laid in the grain rather than the stalk as had been previously thought. She also studied the seventeen year locust and fungi as botanical pests. She first described Magicicada cassinii, a species of periodical cicada, which were later named after John Cassin.[7] Her results were important to agriculture and orchards.[1] She sent her papers to scientific societies such as the American Philosophical Society, which at the time only had men as members so the papers had to be read on her behalf.[8] She also published regularly in the American Agriculturist and other agricultural journals, occasionally under pseudonyms.
Some of the Morris family papers passed, apparently through Margaretta's younger sister, Susan Sophia Morris (1800-1868), the wife of John Stockton Littell (1806-1875), into the Littell family. They are incorporated in the Littell family papers, currently held in the special collections of the library of the University of Delaware.[9]
^ abcElliott, Clark A; Kohlstedt, Sally Gregory (1979). Biographical Dictionary of American Science: The Seventeenth Through the Nineteenth Centuries. Westport and London: Greenwood Press. p. 185. ISBN978-0-313-20419-7.
^Willis Conner Sorensen (1995). Brethren of the Net: American Entomology, 1840-1880. History of American science and technology series. University of Alabama Press. ISBN9780817307554.
^Willis Conner Sorensen (1995). Brethren of the Net: American Entomology, 1840-1880. History of American science and technology series. University of Alabama Press. p. 188. ISBN9780817307554.
^ abJoy Harvey and Marilyn Ogilvie (1 January 2000). "Margaretta Morris". In Marilyn Ogilvie; Joy Harvey (eds.). The Biographical Dictionary of Women in Science. Vol. 2. New York and London: Routledge. p. 917. ISBN978-0-415-92040-7.
