Entomological Notes. 271 



trol. Many calling them the army worm believe that they come 

 from some unknown place, in some accountable manner, fully 

 armed and commissioned for the work of destruction; but their 

 origin and development is at, or near, the field of their operations. 

 Every step can be seen by the careful observer, and in every stage 

 cf their development, for nearly the whole year through, they are 

 exposed to the attacks of those who earnestly seek their destruc- 

 tion. The farmer or gardener who allows them to come year after 



# 



year, destroying both fruit and tree, has no one to blame but him- 

 self; it is not chargeable to Providence, old Adam or anything else 

 except his own ignorance, indolence or shiftlessness. 



The worms first make their appearance soon after the leaves start 

 in the spring, usually about the first of May, hatching from eggs 

 laid the previous summer by the parent moth on the twigs of the 

 trees, near or on the new wood growth. They readily find and feed 

 upon the tender leaflets, and at once begin to spin a company web 

 in some convenient fork of the limbs, to serve as shelter from heat 

 and storm in the earlier stages of their growth; each adds its 

 silken thread to make their common home. For the first week or 

 ten days they gather here at night and in inclement weather, going 

 out in the forenoon to the nearest leaves to feed. Each worm as it 

 passes back and forth, spins its thread, which soon forms a silky 

 highway on which they travel much more readily. Being very 

 small at this stage, they usually escape notice, unless attention is 

 drawn to their glistening web; but their growth is rapid. In a 

 week or ten days they cease to gather nightly in their tent; a few 

 may be found there still, but the largest part lie on limbs near 

 where they have been feeding during the day, or gather in masses 

 on the larger limbs, and even on the body of the tree, in the same 

 manner as the forest tent caterpillar does, and often remain inact- 

 ive and torpid for hours, while moulting. After casting their skins 

 they scatter and devour the leaves with increased vigor. There 

 are four of these changes in the four or six weeks passed in the 

 larva? state. 



Harris describes the worm " as about two inches in length when 

 fully grown. Their heads are black; extending along the top of 

 the back, from one end to the other, is a whitish line, on each side of 

 which, on a yellow ground, are numerous short and fine crinkled 

 black lines, that, lower down, become mingled together, and form 

 18 — Hort. So. 



