GENERAL NOTES FOR THE YEAR. 



In the absence of any serious outbreak of insect injury during the 

 year, the following notes on some of the more common species that are 

 with us in greater or less abundance annually, may be put on record. 



The fall tent-caterpillar, Hyphantria cunea (Drury), has been 

 noticeably abundant in various parts of the State — in Oswego county 

 and elsewhere. 



The injury to the foliage of the elm and horse-chestnut trees on the 

 streets of Albany by the caterpillar of the white-marked tussock-moth, 

 Orgyia leucostigma (Sm.-Abb.), which has been remarked upon in 

 preceding reports, was again quite serious during the past summer. 

 The falling to the pavement of the tips of the elm twigs, consequent on 

 the girdling of the stem by the young larvje for food, was not nearly as 

 abundant as that noticed in 1883 (see Second Report on the Insects of 

 New York) and in some subsequent years, nor was the insect so gen- 

 erally distributed throughout the city. But in certain localities, at 

 about the time of cocoon spinning, the caterpillars could be seen by 

 hundreds on the sidewalls of corner houses, as upon my own residence 

 shaded by several large elms. A row of tall elms opposite had the 

 foliage so severely eaten during the months of June and July as no 

 longer to serve the purpose of shade, and not to be recognizable as elms 

 at a short distance from them. Several horse-chestnut trees in the 

 vicinity were entirely defoliated, excej^t that portions of the larger ribs 

 were left uneaten. 



The Dryocampa ruhicunda (Fabr.) catei-pillar very seldom appears 

 in harmful numbers in New York or the eastern States, but an excep- 

 tional occurrence of it was reported from Monticello, Sullivan count}^, 

 N. y., on the grounds of Mr. John D. Lyons, where a number of soft 

 maple trees, which had been set out by him a few years, before, were 

 completely defoliated by it during the sunmier. In several of 

 the western States, as notably in Kansas, Missouri, and Nebraska, the 

 soft maples planted as shade trees in cities are annually almost stripped 

 of their foliage.* 



• Bulletin No. 14, vol. iii, 1890, of the Agricultural Experiment Station of Nebraska, pp. 54-59. 



