October, '10] BRITTON: INSECT NOTES 435 



Canker worms, chiefly the fall species Alsophila pometaria Harr., 

 were abundant, and their devastation was widespread throughout 

 the state on many different kinds of trees. 



Cut worms were especially troublesome in June, and much damage 

 was reported to this office. 



Sawfly larvae of several unusual kinds were observed feeding upon 

 plants not commonly attacked. The peach sawfly, Pamphilius 

 persicum MacG., defoliated many trees in some of the large peach 

 orchards, and though I have not learned of any attempt to check their 

 ravages by spraying, some of the orchardists are now planning to 

 spray their trees in 1911 with lead arsenate to prevent a repetition of 

 the injury. 



The result of the campaign against the gypsy moth colony at 

 Wallingford has been most satisfactory, and through the efficacy 

 of lead arsenate spraying and of tanglefoot and burlap bands the 

 number of caterpillars was so greatly reduced that before the end of 

 the season the combined efforts of a gang of fifteen men resulted in 

 finding only a few examples during a week of careful searching. At 

 the Stonington infestation good progress was also made, and though 

 more caterpillars were taken than in 1909, the whole number might 

 have been produced by a single egg-mass overlooked in scouting 

 during the winter. 



The brown-tail moth, Euproctis chrysorrhoea Linn., which has 

 hitherto not appeared in Connecticut except on nursery stock im- 

 ported from Europe, was found at Thompson in April, 1910, by some 

 men who were engaged in pruning trees on a large estate. We sent 

 men to the vicinity to investigate, and seven or eight pear and apple 

 trees were found infested, and were at once sprayed with lead arsenate. 

 Later some nearly full-grown caterpillars were discovered at Putnam. 

 Both of these towns are in the northeast corner of the state, and the 

 infestation is no doubt due to the natural spread of the pest, which 

 for two or three years has been known to be near the borders of Con- 

 necticut in both Massachusetts and Rhode Island. A systematic 

 examination must be made of this region after the leaves drop, combin- 

 ed with the destruction of all winter nests found. 



During the past few weeks nearly all of the birches known as the 

 white, gray, or bobbin birch, Betula populifolia, have been defoliated 

 by the birch bucculatrix, Bucculatrix canadensisella Chamb,, through- 

 out the northern and eastern portions of the state. This insect, though 

 a pest in northern New England and in certain seasons in Massachusetts 

 and Rhode Island, has not during my residence of over sixteen years 

 in Connecticut shown any such outbreak. 



Other points worth noting in this paper are the increasing damage 



