132 Report of State Board of Horticulture. 



of the codling moth. Amongst the rubbish on the ground and in the fence 

 corners, and under the loose scaly bark of its moss-covered limbs, are 

 numerous choice spots in which it can pass through its wonderful trans- 

 formations securely hidden from all foes. Many larvae of the second 

 generation are yet in the fruit where it is gathered and are carried with 

 it into the storerooms. There they too find suitable place in which to 

 pupate in cracks and crevices about the room and the packages in which 

 the fruit is stored. In fact, when such storerooms are in proximity to 

 orchards they form a prolific source of infection in spring unless some 

 method is employed to prevent the escape of the moths. It is also certain 

 that the principal means by which the insect is introduced into new re- 

 gions is in the packages in which infested apples or pears have been packed. 

 It would be interesting, and perhaps profitable, to know where all the 

 larvae spin their cocoons in well cared for orchards of smooth young trees. 

 Four or five years ago Mr. H. B. Miller, a successful orchardist of Grants 

 Pass, suggested to me that many of them must pupate in the soil. Mr. 

 Miller based his suggestions on the fact that very few cocoons indeed could 

 be found on his trees; and that he believed he had obtained good results 

 in lessening the amount of codling moth injury in his orchard by frequent 

 cultivation, in 1898 at least seventy-five per cent of the Ben Davis apples 

 in a certain orchard near Corvallis were rendered unmarketable by codling 

 moth injuries. In fact the crop was not gathered. Hundreds of wormy 

 apples lay on the ground under every tree. Late in the fall I examined 

 six of these trees carefully. They were not old. The bark was smooth 

 and healthy except for an occasional spot of apple tree anthracnose. On 

 the six trees I found less than a half dozen cocoons. Most of these were 

 in a piece of cloth that had been left in a crotch; only two or three were 

 found on the trees proper and these were about old anthracnose scars. 

 I was convinced that most of the larvae must be secreted under clods and 

 other objects on the gi-ound or about the crowns of various plants; but 

 together with an assistant, I spent several hours in searching for them 

 without finding a single one. Neither have I ever found any in such places 

 in well cultivated orchards. Nevertheless I believe that in well cared for 

 orchards of clean smooth trees, the larvae do spin their cocoons under 

 clods or any other objects that may lie upon the surface of the soil; and 

 that frequent cultivation may thus be of value by destroying them or 

 exposing them to their enemies. August 15, 1900, I found one larvae in 

 its cocoon, two live pupae ana a number of empty pupae cases in small 

 cracks in the uncultivated soil under an apple tree. Figure k shows a 

 cocoon in a cell in a clod. The bark on this tree was rough and scaly and 

 considerable rubbish lay on the ground under it. There were thus many 

 normal places in which the larvae could have spun their cocoons; that 

 they chose to do so in the ground would seem to indicate that the habit 

 is not unusual. Cooke* states that the cocoons are often found from one 

 to six inches beneath the surface of the soil about the trunk and larger 



* Injurious Insects of the Orchard and Vineyard, p. 102. 



