380 INSECTS INJURIOUS TO VEGETATION. 



is indebted for his basketfuls of worm-eaten windfalls in the 

 stillest weather." 



The apple-worm has been long known in Em'ope, and its 

 history has been written by Rosel, Reaumm*, Kollar, West- 

 wood,* and other European naturalists. A good account of 

 it, and of its transformations, by Joseph Tufts, Esq., of 

 Charlestown, Massachusetts, was published in the year 1819, 

 in the fifth volume of " The Massachusetts Agricultural E,e- 

 pository and Journal ;" and JVL*. Joseph Burrelle, of Quincy, 

 Massachusetts, has also made some remarks on the same 

 insect, in the eighteenth volume of " The New England 

 Farmer."! At various times, between the middle of June 

 and the first of July, the apple-worm moths may be found. 

 They are sometimes seen in houses in the evening, trying to 

 get through the windows into the open air, having been 

 brought in with fruit while they were in the caterpillar state. 

 Their fore wings, when seen at a distance, have somewhat the 

 appearance of brown watered silk ; when closely examined 

 they will be found to be crossed by numerous gray and brown 

 lines, scalloped like the plumage of a bird ; and near the hind 

 angle there is a large, oval, dark brown spot, the edges of 

 which are of a bright copper color. The head and thorax are 

 brown mingled with gray ; and the hind wings and abdomen 

 are light yellowish brown, with the lustre of satin. Its wings 

 expand three quarters of an inch. This insect is readily dis- 

 tinguished from other moths by the large, oval, brown spot, 

 edged with copper color, on the hinder margin of each of the 

 fore wings. During the latter part of June and the month of 

 July, these fruit-moths fly about apple-trees every evening, and 

 lay their eggs on the young fruit. They do not puncture 

 the apples, but they drop their eggs, one by one, in the eye or 

 hollow at the blossom-end of the fruit, where the skin is most 

 tender. They seem also to seek for early fruit rather than for 

 the late kinds, which we find are not so apt to be wormy as 



* " Gardener's Magazine," Vol. XIV., p. 234. 



t Page 398. See also some remarks on this insect in my " Discourse before 

 the Massachusetts Horticultural Society, in 1832," page 42. 



