The Moths and Butterflies 



381 



FIG. 542. The rus- 

 set-brown tortrix, 

 Platynota flavedana. 

 (After Lugger; 

 natural size.) . 



may often be seen cleverly engaged in extracting one by one the toothsome 

 morsels from their homes. Hovering over a rolled leaf, the bill is carefully 

 thrust into the roll for the unseen caterpillar and rarely withdrawn without 

 it. Lugger says that the Baltimore oriole is particularly expert at this sort 

 of hunting unseen prey. 



A certain Tortricid, accidentally imported many years ago from Europe, has 

 become one of our serious grape pests. This is the grape-berry moth, Eu- 

 demis bolrana, whose small slender whitish-green, black- 

 headed larvae bore into green and ripening grapes and 

 feed there on the pulp and seeds. When full-grown the 

 larva becomes olive-green or dark brown and, forsaking 

 the grape-berry, cuts out of a grape-leaf a little flap which 

 it folds over and fastens with silk, thus forming a small 

 oblong case within which it pupates. The moth expands 

 f inch, and has slaty-blue fore wings, marked with dark 

 reddish-brown bands and spots, while the hind wings are uniform dull brown. 

 Another well-known Tortricid pest is the bud-moth, Tmetocera ocellana 

 (Fig. 543), whose larvae burrow into opening fruit- and leaf -buds on apple- 

 trees and eat them. The moth expands f inch and is 

 dark ashen-gray with a large irregular whitish band on 

 the fore wing. 



By far the best known and most feared and hated 



F Th Tortricid is the codlin-moth, Carpocapsa pomonella (Figs, 



spotted bud-moth, 545 and 546), the most important enemy of the apple- 



Tmetocera ocellana. or rower Distributed all over the United States, wherever 



(After Lugger, 



natural size.) apples are grown, minute and obscure so as to be 



easily overlooked until fairly intrenched in the orchard, 

 prolific and subject to no very disastrous parasitic attacks, this frail little 

 species causes losses to fruit-growers of no less than $10,000,000 annually. 

 The moth, which hides by day and is seldom seen, has the fore wings 

 marked with alternate irregular transverse wavy streaks of ash-gray and 

 brown, with a large tawny spot on the inner 

 hind angle, the hind wings and abdomen 

 light yellowish brown with a satiny luster. It 

 lays its eggs (for the first generation, the species 

 being two-brooded over most of the country) 

 on the top of the newly forming apple, or 

 sometimes, as recently observed in California, 

 on the side of the tiny fruit. The larvae, hatch- 

 ing in from three to five days, begin to feed on 

 the green fruit, soon burrowing into its center. 

 They become full-grown before the apples ripen, burrow out and crawl 



FIG. 544. The cranberry 

 worm-moth, Rhopobota vac- 

 ciniana. (After Lugger; 

 natural size indicated by 

 line.) 



