270 



STATE BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



On May 2, 1902, the insects at Ypsilanti were all immature, crawl- 

 ing about or else secreted in the cracks of the bark, the young males 

 being small and reddish-yellow in color, and the young females being 

 yellow in color and slightly larger than the males. Soon after this the 

 males spun small, oval cocoons and after a period, emerged. On June 

 24th, Mr. E. N. Colby kindly sent me another lot, this time of adult fe- 

 males in their niduses or egg-masses. 



Fig. 19.— The maple cotlony false meiily-bug, from Howard, Insect Life. U. S. Dept. of Affr. 



The life-history of this insect was worked out by Miss Emily A. 

 Smith, and published in "North American Entomologist," Vol. 1, p. 73, 

 1880. It was completed by Dr. L. O. Howard, in ''Insect Life." Miss 

 Smith credits the insect with raising three broods each year. They are 

 said to migrate to the trunk of the tree, after reaching maturity on the 

 leaves, and then to meet the males, after which they go back to the 

 leaves to lay their eggs. Here they become conspicuous, owing to the 

 dense mass of cottony matter that is pushed out to form the nest. All 

 through these loose masses are found eggs, the females occuping places 

 at the centers of the masses. 



The female, on being boiled out in caustic potash, is found to be oval 

 in form, from three to four millimeters long and perhaps two-thirds as 



