354 INSECTS INJURIOUS TO VEGETATION. 



man observed the same insect in the town of Egremont, in 

 Berkshire county, Massachusetts. It was separated from the 

 wheat, in great quantities, by threshing and winnowing the 

 grain.* On the twenty-sixth of September, 1846, my brother 

 brought to me a sample of wheat-ears, from Dixmont, Maine, 

 containing five of these insects, of different sizes. The largest 

 measured five eighths of an inch in length, when fully ex- 

 tended. It was a very slender caterpillar, having sixteen legs, 

 and was not a true span-worm either in structure or motions. 

 It was of a pale reddish brown color, with three longitudinal 

 paler or colorless lines on the back, and a broader pale stripe 

 on each side of the body. The head and the tops of the first 

 and last segments were shining brown. A few minute black 

 points (each furnishing a short inconspicuous hair) were regu- 

 larly disposed on each segment. The body beneath and all 

 the legs were pale brownish red. Many of the kernels of 

 wheat had been gnawed by these caterpillars; but they refused 

 to eat any more, and died without change. In the summer of 

 1850, Dr. Ovid Plumb had the kindness to send to me some 

 younger specimens of these caterpillars, from Salisbury, Con- 

 necticut, where they had long prevailed in the wheat-fields; 

 and I saw them in the wheat at the same place, on the twenty- 

 fifth of July, 1851. They had grown only to the length of 

 three sixteenths or one fourth of an inch at most; but they 

 resembled the larger specimens from Maine in all essential 

 particulars. They were too young and delicate to survive the 

 effects of a journey without fresh food, which could not be 

 procured for them after my return. When disturbed, they 

 readily suspended themselves by a slender thread, were very 

 uneasy on being taken from the ears, and were quick in all 

 their motions. Previous accounts concerning their habits and 

 depredations were fully confirmed by observations and infor- 

 mation at Salisbury. These wheat-worms, or wheat-cater- 

 pillars, as they ought to be called, if these accounts really refer 

 to the same kind of insect, are supposed by some persons to 

 be identical with the clover-worms, which have been found in 



* " Second Report on the Agriculture of Massachusetts," p. 99. 



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