EXPERIMENT STATION BULLETINS. 



253: 



When the larva becomes full grown he pulls together the opposite edges of his mine 

 until he makes a fold in the leaf, when the tiny room thus formed is lined Avith silk 

 and the tranformation to the pupal stage is made. The adult which comes forth from 

 this humble abode is a delicate little moth measuring slightly more than one-quarter 



Fig 



Apple-Leaf-miner, Tischerici malifoUeVa, larva an(l[a(lult. 

 ^Orig■inaI.) 



of an inch from tip to tip of its extended wings. Fig. 0. 

 The color of the front wings is dark brown with a purplisii 

 tinge dusted with occasional scales of yellow. The hind 

 wings are dark grey; the head and body are colored some- 

 what after the manner of the front .wings. These dainty 

 little moths mate and lay eggs that hatch out into the 

 caterpillars which mine the leaves. 



If the apple leaf-miner would confine its attention to the apple, and not increase 

 its numbers more than it is in the habit of doing, no one would find fault with it. but 

 there arc other hosts on which it thrives and among them the blackberry. In working 

 on the blackberry, the leaf miner builds a much larger mine, often using up the greater 

 p=irt of the leaf for this purpose. In the experimental plots at the South Haven 

 Sub-station, the damage was quite considerable, resulting in greatly weakening the 

 plants. The insects seem to breed in the neighboring apple trees and to come to the. 

 blackberries from there. The specimen from which the accompanying figure was drawn, 

 was bred from a mine in blackberry on September 14, rather a late date, but no others, 

 came with it, although many mines were enclosed in tlie same cage. The mines of an 

 insect — almost certainly this species — were found neixr by on wild running blackberry 

 and wild crab-apple. 



REMEDIES. 



As the insect works inside of the leaf where no poisons will reach it, the only 

 practical remedy is to mechanically destroy the larvae and pupae in the mines of the . 

 leaves. As stated, there are two broods, one going into the pupal stage in July, and' 

 the other in September and caily October. The October brood passes the winter in the 

 mines and emerges in the spring, usually in May. Now if we gather up the leaves, 

 .just before snow falls or very early in the .spring, and burn them, we shall kill all the. 

 insects contained in them. Of course the leaves. under the apple trees should be gathered' 

 al.so and burned at the same time. 



