94 THE CANADIAN ENTOMOLOGIST. 



occurs on page ;^;^ of the Report of the Entomological Society of Ontario 

 for 1872, by Rev. C. J. S. Bethune. As an appendix to h-is paper on Hop 

 Insects, he gives descriptions of an unknown larva feeding "upon the crown 

 of the root," and which he was unable to rear. The size of the larvae and 

 the general points of description agree so well with the unscientific 

 descriptions given by my correspondents, the growers, that I unhesitatingly 

 pronounce them to be the destructive hop borers, which are the subject 

 of this paper. 



The pest has been known to cultivators of the hop for many years — 

 indeed it is reported from Oneida county that it has always been known 

 in the locality — and other hop growing districts have felt its presence for 

 longer or shorter periods. In Juneau county, Wisconsin, it was first 

 noticed in 1867, while the observer in Waupaca county had not noticed it 

 prior to 1881. The percentage of destruction varies in different sections 

 from almost nothing, where kept under control, or yards are new, to 25, 

 50, and even a greater percentage where the yards are old, badly infested, 

 or not looked after. These facts lead a New York grower to state, in his 

 opinion, that it is best to abandon yards after six or eight years' culture, 

 and change to new ground, for " grubs will get into a yard after two or 

 three years, gradually increase, and in eight or ten years spoil the yard." 

 Other growers contend that only the yards of the ignorant and shiftless are 

 ever damaged to any extent by the borer. 



I shall not attempt to give a description of the larva here further than 

 to say that all correspondents agree in the statement that it is an inch and 

 a quarter to an inch and a half in length, and three-sixteenths to one-fourth 

 inch in diameter at maturity, whitish or light gray in color with a dark head. 



As soon as the vines start from the ground in May and June, and when 

 but a few inches high, the mother insect begins the attack by depositing 

 her eggs upon them. The subsequent injury is thus described by Mr. 

 Pierpont, a large grower of Ontario county : 



" The warm sun hatching the egg deposited in the head of the hop 

 vine, soon after it is out of the ground, it soon becomes a lively worm 

 about one-fourth of an inch in length, subsisting upon the sap of the vine. 

 It leaves the head of the vine soon after hatching, enters the ground, bores 

 to the centre of the vine and works up an inch or two, finally locating 

 where the vine starts from the crown, eating at this point and at the crown 

 until the vine is nearly or quite destroyed, and the crown weakened by 

 water getting in, causing decay, and finally the destruction of the entire hill." 



