260 Forty-second Effort on the State Museum. [118] 



river, under date of August 5, 1888, as follows, of some insects that 

 came under his observation : 



I believe you would be interested were you with us, for we are 

 constantly meeting what are, to us, such novel forms of insect life 

 that I feel confident you would find some undescribed species. "What 

 seems to me most novel, from an entomological standpoint, is the 

 abundance of larvtie of the kind known as " measuring-worms." I 

 never saw so many of these insects in the woods. They attack the 

 witch-hobble [Vibwrnum lantanoides], which is usually quite free from 

 insect injury, and reduce the leaves to skeletons. But they do not, 

 by any means, confine their attack to deciduous vegetation, but are 

 also found on evergreens — on balsam and spruce — and their number is 

 infinite. The common form is a bright green worm of about one 

 inch in length: another is a dark gray or brown. Both of these 

 attack the human being with a sharp and painful bite — a surprising 

 thing, as I have never known such larvse to attack animals before. 

 They are certainly worthy of your observation and study. 



The Apple-leaf Bucculatrix. 

 Through Dr. Sturtevant, of the New York Agricultural Experiment 

 Station, a communication was received from Mr. Malcolm Little, of 

 Malcolm, Seneca county, N. Y., stating that the apj)le orchards in 

 that vicinity were infested upon the branches and the fruit with 

 objects such as sent upon some twigs. They had not been seen 

 before, and it was asked what they were, and if they would probably 

 prove injurious. Answer to the following effect was returned : 



The twigs received were thickly covered on one side with the 



cocoons of the apple-leaf Buc- 

 culatrix — Bucculatrix pomi- 

 foliella Clemens. A piece of 

 twig an inch and a quarter in 

 length, and one-eighth of an 

 inch in diameter, had upon it 

 thirty-three of these cocoons. 

 From the small size and the 

 general appearance of the 

 cocoons they are often mis- 

 taken for insect eggs. They 



c,,„ or A 1 1 * T> 1 i • T> are white, about one-fourth of 



iiG. 35.— Apple-leaf Bucculatrix, BuccuLATEis 



pomifoliella: a, piece of twig covered with CO- an inch long, as thick as an 



coons ; b, cocoon enlarged ; c, the moth, enlarged, ordinary pin and show upon 



their exposed surface five or six prominent longitudinal ribs as 

 represented at a in Fig. 35, and at b in enlargement. 



The insect is an injurious one. Where it abounds, the caterpillars 

 consume such an amount of the foliage as seriously to interfere v/ith 

 the production of the fruit. It displays a remarkable facility for 



