184 PLUM. 



respectively hy Dr. Taschenberg, Dr. Eitzema Bos, and also 

 by Canon Schmidberger,* under different scientific appella- 

 tions, adding thereby not a little to the difficulties of identi- 

 fication. 



The life-history of the Plum Sawfly, as given by the above 

 writers, is in its main points as follows : — The female sawfly 

 begins her operations by making a slit in a calyx-leaf of a 

 Plum blossom or expanding bud. Apparently only one egg is 

 laid in each blossom (or rather calyx). The egg is very small, 

 greenish white, and transparent. 



The caterpillar hatches in about from a week to a fort- 

 night's time, and eats its way into the young embryo fruit, 

 where it consumes within what would have been the kernel ; 

 and when it has consumed all that suits its purpose for food 

 in one Plum, it goes on to another. This caterpillar is, as we 

 observe of our own, twenty-footed ; the colour whitish, or 

 with a reddish yellow tinge ; head dark brown or yellow ; 

 body lesser towards the hinder extremity, and it gives out a 

 strong bug-like smell. 



The caterpillar is full-grown in a period variously observed 

 as from three to four, or five to six weeks. Then the young 

 Plum falls, the caterpillar creeps out, buries itself in the 

 ground, where it spins a cocoon; here it is stated to spend 

 the winter, still in the larval state, and in spring to change 

 to the chrysalis or pupal state, from which the perfect sawfly 

 comes out in time to lay her eggs amongst the opening Plum 

 blossoms. The flies are somewhat like the Apple Sawfly. 

 figured at p. 35, with two pairs of transparent wings ; the 

 general colour black or shining black ; legs mostly yellow, or 

 of a reddish or brown yellow. 



The above notes of life-history are taken from the observa- 

 tions of Dr. Taschenberg, Dr. Eitzema Bos, and Canon Schmid- 

 berger, published in their respective works referred to below. 



Means of prevention and remedy (also given by the same 



* In the ' Praktische Insektenkunde ' of Dr. Taschenberg the name given is 

 that oi Hoplocamjjaf ulvicornis, Klug; in the ' Tierische Schadlinge und Niitz- 

 liuge ' of Dr. Ritzema Bos, it is Selandria fulvicornis, King, and the internal 

 evidence of quotation in each of these papers shows it to be the same insect, of 

 which a very good account is given by Schmidberger in ' Kollar's Insects,' under 

 the name of Tenthredo morio. Fab. A short account of the infestation corre- 

 sponding with the above, so far as a few lines can correspond with full descrip- 

 tions, is also given in Kaltenbach's ' Pflanzenfeinde ' under the name of 

 Selandria fulvicornig, Klug. It is, however, very requisite, in mention of the 

 Tenthredo morio. Fab., to notice also the name of the authority by whom it is 

 so called, as the Selandria = Tenthredo morio. Fab., of Cameron's 'Men. of the 

 British Phytophagous Hymenoptera' (vol. i. p. 199), and the S. morio, Fab., of 

 Taschenberg's ' Insektenkunde,' are clearly different insects from the T. morio 

 of Schmidberger, inasmuch as the caterpillar is stated to have a green body 

 spotted with black, whereas the colour of the caterpillar of the kind described 

 above is whitish or yellowish. 



