256 INSECTS INJURIOUS TO VEGETATION. 



feelers, the collar, the edges of the shoulder-covers, and three 

 very narrow rings on the abdomen, are golden yellow. The 

 wings expand three quarters of an inch, or a little more. 



Some years ago, it was ascertained that a species of ^g-eria 

 inhabited the pear-tree in this State ; and it is said that con- 

 siderable injury has resulted from it. An infested tree may 

 be known by the castings thrown out of the small perforations 

 made by the borers, which live under the bark of the trunk, 

 and subsist chiefly upon the inner bark. They make their 

 cocoons under the bark, and change to chrysalids in the latter 

 part of summer. The winged insects appear in the autumn, 

 having, like others of this kind, left their chrysalis skins 

 projecting from the orifice of the holes which they had pre- 

 viously made. In its winged form, this ^geria is very much 

 like that which inhabits the currant-bush ; but it is a smaller 

 species. It was described by me in the year 1830, under the 

 name of JE^eria Pyri, the pear-tree iEgeria ; and my account 

 of it will be found on the second page of the ninth volume of 

 the " New England Farmer." Its wings expand rather more 

 than half an inch ; are transparent, but veined, bordered, and 

 fringed with purplish black, and across the tips of the fore 

 wings is a broad dark band glossed with coppery tints ; the 

 prevailing color of the upper side of the body is purple-black ; 

 but most of the under side is golden yellow, as are the edges 

 of the collar, of the shoulder-covers, and of the fan-shaped 

 brush on the tail, and there is a broad yellow band across the 

 middle of the abdomen, preceded by two narrow bands of the 

 same color. 



There are several more insects* belonging to this group in 

 Massachusetts, one of which lives in the stems of the lilac, 

 and another inhabits those of the wild currant, Ribes floridum. 

 The winged male of the latter species is remarkable for the 

 very long, slender, and cylindrical tuft or pencil at the extremity 

 of the body. Of the rest, there is nothing particularly worthy 

 of note. 



*See "Silliman's Journal," Vol. XXXYI., p. 309 to 313. 



