THE FRUIT-TREE LEAF-ROLLER 



Ar chips argyrospila 



Order, Lepidoptera Superfamily, Tortricina 



Glenn W. Herri ck 



In his eleventh report, 1896, Dr. J. A. Lintner gave a list of 356 species 

 of insects that were enemies to the apple. Many of these, in fact the ma- 

 jority, are not serious enemies. However, each one is known to make the 

 apple tree and its fruit, at times, its food by choice and one can never 

 tell when the least injurious species may suddenly become a most serious 

 pest. In this list of Doctor Lintner's, the fruit-tree leaf -roller (Fig. 59), 

 a relatively unimportant pest at that time in New York, was included. 

 Fifteen years have elapsed since the list was made, and during that time 

 nothing was heard of the leaf -roller until in 191 1, when it suddenly came 

 into prominence as a serious pest to apples and a minor one to pears. 

 It furnishes simply another instance in which an insect, previously 

 unimportant, suddenly and inexplicably multiplies to an enormous 

 degree and reaches the rank of a serious pest at a single bound. 



For many years the growers of Colorado, Missouri, and other western 

 States have had to contend with this leaf-roller, but until very recently 

 the eastern growers have been comparatively free from its ravages. The 

 adult moths have been collected from Maine to California, but evidently 

 they have never been abundant in the extreme East. In the spring of 

 191 1, however, the larvae of this species appeared in enormous numbers 

 in the orchards of W. O. Page at Bethany Center, N. Y., and to a consider- 

 able extent in neighboring orchards. In the orchards of Mr. Page they 

 proved a very serious pest. Moreover, the apple leaf-roller was not con- 

 fined by any means to a small and limited area, but the larvae were found 

 in many orchards of New York in varying numbers. Whether or not 

 this thin, but rather wide, distribution among the apple orchards of the 

 State means a general and rapid increase of the pest, remains to be seen; 

 it is quite probable, however, that the insect has become rather thor- 

 oughly established and will develop into a gradually increasing and trouble- 

 some pest.. 



HISTORY OF THE FRUIT-TREE LEAF-ROLLER 



So far as the writer has been able to find, the first reference to this 

 leaf -roller as a pest of economic importance in this country was made by 



Author's acknowledgments. — Thanks are due Harry Knight for his aid in making some of the photo- 

 graphs in this bulletin, and for his assistance in the rearing of the ugly-nest leaf-roller; to H. L. Viereck 

 for his determination of parasites; and to R. W. Braucher for sending the writer material from the field. 



Glenn W. Herrick. 

 279 



