Packakd] IXSECTS of THE GARDEIST. 43 



beyond its natural limits when introduced into a new coun- 

 tf}', where its native insect parasites and bird enemies (if 

 such there be) cannot reduce its numbers . 



It was imported from Europe into nurseries at Rochester, 

 New York, during the year ISGO. It seems since that time 

 to have spread westward and eastward, arriving in eastern 

 Massachusetts about 18G5, and since tlien has been very 

 destructive in gardens in New England, including the east- 

 ern part of Maine. 



The parent of this worm is a saw fly, so named from bear- 

 ing a saw-like sting, or ovipositor, with which it pierces the 

 leaves or stalks of plants, cutting a gash, in which it 

 deposits an egg, the egg passing out from the ovarj' through 

 the oviduct, and thence through the blades of the ovipositor 

 into the wound made in the plant. "While most of the mem- 

 bers of this family cut a gash in the leaf, into which an egg 

 is pushed, a few, as in the present insect, simply place them 

 on the under surface of the leaf, as seen in Fig. 34. The fly 

 has four wings, and belongs to the group of insects (Hymen- 

 optera) that comprises the bee, wasp and ichneumon fl}'. 



The following account of its habits is taken from the 

 writer's "Guide to the Study of Insects : " "•There are about 

 fifty species of Nematus in this country, of which the most 

 injurious one, the gooseberry saw fly, has been brought from 

 Europe. Professor Winchell, who has studied this insect in 

 Ann Arbor, Mich., where it has been very destructive, ob- 

 served the female on tlie IGth of June, while depositing her 

 cylindrical, whitish and transparent eggs in regular rows 

 along the under side of the veins of the leaves, at the rate 

 of about one in forty-five seconds. The embryo escapes 

 from the egg in four days. It feeds, moults and burrows 

 into the ground within a period of eiglit days. It remains 

 thirteen da^'s in the ground, being most of the time in the 

 pupa state, Avhile the fly lives nine da3's. The first l)rood 

 of worms appeared May 21st ; the second brood June 2oth." 



It 



