FIELD BOOK OF INSECTS. 



or so long, with a deep scar on one side. There are usually 

 a number of these galls in a row. A . ater is much like it, 

 but black. Its female also lays her eggs in grapevines but, 

 instead of putting them in a longitudinal line, she deposits 

 them in a circle around the cane, girdling the vine so that 

 it breaks off. 



Trichobaris trinotata is about .14 in. long; black, with 

 white, scale-like hairs, except on the scutellum and two 

 spots on the pronotum. Its larva is the Potato-stalk 

 Borer but it also lives in nettle. 



Craponius in&qualis, the Grape Curculio, is not over 

 .13 in. long; dark brown, with scattered patches of whitish 

 hairs. The hibernated adults feed on grape leaves until 

 the berries are about a fourth grown w r hen the female lays 

 her eggs in them, the larvae feeding on the seeds, and 

 dropping to the ground to pupate under stones, and the 

 like, or just below the surface. 



Ceutorliyncus rapce larvas live in the seed stalks of 

 cabbage but more often in wild Crucifers. 



Conotrachclus nenuphar (Plate LXXXVI) is the Plum 

 Curculio but it breeds also in peach, cherry, and apple, 

 causing an annual loss in the United States of more than 

 $8,000,000. It is about .25 in. long; dark brown, varied 

 with black; pubescence brownish-yellow, forming a curved, 

 forked line on each side of the pronotum ; an elytral band of 

 yellow and white hairs back of the middle. "The adults 

 hibernate, and issue from their winter quarters about 

 the time the trees are in bloom, feeding on the tender 

 foliage, buds, and blossoms. Later they attack the newly 

 set fruit, cutting small circiilar holes through the skin 

 in feeding, while the females, in the operation of egg-laying, 

 make the small, crescent-shaped punctures so commonly 

 found on plums and other stone fruits. The egg, deposited 

 under the skin of the fruit, soon hatches into a very small 

 whitish grub, which makes its way into the flesh of the 

 fruit. Here it feeds greedily and grows rapidly, becoming, 

 in the course of a fortnight, the fat, dirty white 'worm' 

 so well known to fruit growers. When the larva obtains 

 full growth, which requires some twelve to eighteen days, 

 it bores its way out of the fruit and enters the soil, where it 

 forms an earthen cell in which to pupate." 



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