Climbing Cutworms. 653 



a few main branches so distort and stunt their growth as to render 

 the tree verj un symmetrical and often of little value. Last spring 

 one fruit grower at Forest Lawn, N. Y., had nearly all of his 

 recently-set peach trees killed in one night by the cutworms. 

 When there are not buds enough to go around, some of the worms 

 gnaw off the bark on the branches, often girdling them ; in one 

 orchard where they were prevented from getting to the buds, they 

 ate off large patches of the bark on the trunks of the trees. They 

 usually begin operations in the spring soon after the buds begin to 

 swell. Those found at work on April 27th, were of different sizes, 

 ranging from ' half gro\/n to nearly full-grown. Their most 

 destructive work was done on the opening buds of young trees in 

 Apiil and May ; some of the worms continued to feed upon the 

 foliage during June. In June, one grower, "found green peach 

 leaves sticking into the sand and on digging found the cutwonn at 

 the lower end." Peach trees of all sizes, ages, and varieties were 

 attacked indiscriminately, but the cutworms were not so numerous 

 as to produce noticeable injury on large bearing trees in but few in- 

 stances. Trees more than three years from the bud were rarely 

 killed, but younger trees were often set back from one to two years' 

 growth. Grape-vines, berry-bushes, and all kinds of crops grown on 

 the sandy soils also suffered much injury from the same species of 

 cutworms. 



It was especially noticeable that the cutworms did the most 

 damage on trees and other plants set in the sandy soils. Orchards 

 a few rods away on heavier soils suffered comparatively little. So 

 loose is the sandy soil in many of these peach orchards that it is 

 often drifted by the winds ; these are ideal places for peach trees 

 and unfortunately for cutworms also. Such soils are easily kept 

 free from weeds and grass and the cutworms are thus driven to the 

 trees for food. One grower noted that the trees he set in a meadow 

 were not disturbed, and those in cultivated ground next to a meadow 

 were but slightly damaged. 



In 1894, we saw in operation several methods for combating the 

 pests, and we tested others. The different methods are discussed in 

 detail on page 670. 



Our observations and breeding experiments show that there are 

 at least four different kinds of cutworms engaged in climbing 

 peach trees in Wayne and Monroe counties. A detailed, illus- 

 trated account of the lives of each of these species will now be 



