ENTOMOLOGICAL SOCIETY OF ONTARIO. 81 



across a six-acre field. They only attack the very first leaf-bads and the bark of the young 

 trees when first set out ; or when a young tree is budded and cut oti' near the ground, 

 by eating the bud they destroy the tree. " In many of their habits they resemble the 

 potato beetle, such as letting themhelves drop to the ground and lying apparently dead ; 

 and in warm sunny days they move about and eat, and on cold or wet ones they lie con- 

 cealed at the root of the tree in the earth. When the beetles are most destructive, there 

 is nothing to spray, as the top is cut off", and it is a mere switch with nothing to hold the 

 mixture." As these beetles are wingless, and have to climb up the stems of trees to 

 attack them, any mechanical means of prevention, such as a band of cotton batting or one 

 of the various kinds of tree protectors, placed around the trunks at the time the perfect 

 beetles occur, would prevent injury by the mature insects. In the case of young budded 

 stock, a strip, of tin bent into a ring about tour inches in diameter, and pressed into the 

 ground around the base of the stem, similar to thoss now so generally used by gardeners 

 for cut- worms, might be serviceable. 



I am informed by Dr. J. Hamilton that he has bred this beetle in Pennsylvania 

 from the stems of the Rag- weed, Ambrosia trijlda, where the larva had lived as a borer ; 

 but I think it must have some other larval habit in Canada, as this plant is only an 

 accidental weed in a few places in Ontario. 



The Spotted Paria (Paria sexnotata, Say,) is another beetle which requires mention as a 

 serious pest of the raspberry. It has given great trouble on some of the fruit farms in the 

 neighbourhood of Grimsby and St. Catharines for several years past. It was first brought 

 to my notice by Mr. Martin Burrell, of St. Catharines, and was so diti^icult to control that 

 he eventually ploughed out the whole of the infested patch. He wrote in 1892 : " My old 

 enemy, P. sexnotata, has revisited me this spring in greater numbers than ever. I sprayed 

 with Paris green, 4 ounces to 30 gallons, but the foe still ' bobbed up serenely.' Of a 

 quarter of an acre of my raspberries not a score of canes have leafed out. I am not the 

 only victim this year, as several of my neighbours have been severely injured by the 

 beetles." 



Mr. John Craig, Horticulturist, of the Central Experimental Farm, found this insect 

 also very abundant early in May, in raspberry plantations on the road between Hamilton and 

 Grimsby ; and Mr. Linus Woolverton, the energetic secretary of the Fruit Growers' Asso- 

 ciation of Ontario, sent me last spring specimens, with the report that they were doing 

 much harm about Grimsby by eating out the fruit buds of raspberries, and thus des- 

 troying the crop. The following answer was sent to him : "The beetles you send are the 

 Spotted Paria. This is a most injurious insect, and has done much damage in the way 

 you describe, at St. Catharines. It seems to be very difficult to kill. I would suggest your 

 dusting the raspberry bushes at once with Paris green and slaked lime, 1 pound of 

 Paris green to 25 of lime. This mixture is easiest applied by putting it in a bag of 

 cheese-clo h and shaking or tapping it over the bushes. Of course, if you can get a 

 morninij when there is a dew on them, so much the better. The beetles may also 

 be killed in large numbers by beating or shaking them off the canes into an open pan 

 containing water, with a little coal oil on the top. A good plan for collecting them 

 is to hold an open and inverted umbrella beneath the canes when beating them, and 

 then brush the insects out into the coal oil pan." 



The Spotted Paria does not confine its attacks to the raspberry alone, but is oc- 

 casionally troublesome to strawberries. In 1874, Mr. John McGrady, of Gatineau 

 Point, Que., suff'ered a disastrous attack upon his strawberry beds. He found that 

 hellebore was quite useless against the enemy ; and my experience is that mueb 

 stronger poisons are necessary for this beetle than for many others. 



There have been, of course, many of the well-known fruit pests complained of 

 from various parts of the province, but, with perhaps the excf ption of the Bud Moth 

 in the Grimsby and London districts, and Bucculatrix pomifoliella in western Ontario, 

 no others demand special mention here. 



6 (EN.) 



