THE HEMIPTERA 181 



land found heavily infested may be of assistance, but so far, little or 

 nothing has boon done to combat this pest. 



The Tarnished Plant-bug {Lygus pratensisL.). — The Tarnished Plant- 

 bug is widely distributed, both in Europe and this country. It is about 

 a quarter of an inch long (Fig. 169), shorter and broader in proportion than 

 the Meadow Plant-bug, and varies greatly in its coloration. The general 

 color, however, is brown, variegated with shades of yellowish and brown- 

 ish and with black spots in some places. 



This pest feeds on over 50 different kinds of plants which are 

 of value to man. The adults attack apple, pear, peach, and in fact all 

 fruit tree buds, destroying or at least 

 seriously injuring them: small fruits 

 are often stunted or "buttoned" by 

 them: flower buds of such plants as 

 the chrysanthemum, dahlia, peony 

 and aster are punctured and de- 

 stroyed or malformed: potato leaves 

 are often injured, causing tip-burn, 

 and beets, particularly sugar beets, 

 have their leaves curled and injured. 



^ 1 i i 1 ii • Fig. 109. — Tarnished PI ant- bus 



Corn, wheat, oats and other gram (Lygus pratensis L.) -. a, adult; 6, nearly 



and grass crops are also injured by full-grown nymph. Nearly four times 



., . • r 1 ■\TT•J^^ natural size. (From U. S. D. A. Farm. 



this omnivorous leeder. With young ^^^ll ggg j 



peach trees in nurseries it causes the 



trouble called "stop-back" by killing the terminal buds, and it is a 



cari'ier of the fire-blight of the pear, convoj'ing the bacteria causing this 



disease from infected to healthy trees. It is therefore a serious pest. 



The insect passes the winter as the adult and possibly as the nearly 

 full-grown nymph also, in protected places, and appears with the first 

 warm spring days and attacks the buds of fruit trees and other plants. 

 Its eggs are inserted in leaf veins and stems, flowers and similar places, 

 and they hatch in about 10 days. The nymphs feed on the juices of the 

 plants and become adult in from 3 weeks to a month. There is therefore, 

 time for several generations in a season, though the actual number of these 

 does not appear to have been worked out and probably varies somewhat 

 according to the length of the season in different parts of the country. 



Control. — No effective method of control has as yet been discovered 

 for this pest, though many have been tried. Spraying the plants infested, 

 with kerosene emulsion. Nicotine sulfate or soaps, early in the morning 

 has been found to kill some of them. Shields covered with sticky fly- 

 paper, placed beside and over the plants which are then jarred, captures 

 some: the destruction of all wild plants such as asters and goldenrod on 

 which they feed and breed has been advocated ; and growing plants under 

 cheese-cloth; driving the insects down the wind, and other methods have 

 been suggested, but no really efficient control is yet known. 



