Webworms Injurious to Cereal and Forage Crops. 5 
- There are several other insects whose work on corn may be mis- 
taken for that of webworm larve, but, as their common name indi- 
cates, the most characteristic feature about the webworms is the 
presence of the silken tube or web with which they invariably sur- 
round themselves. The work of billbugs, cutworms, southern corn 
rootworms, wireworms, and stalk-borers bears some resemblance to 
that of webworms, 
but a careful observer 
soon learns to distin- 
guish the characteris- 
tics of éach. 
The presence of 
scars, pits, and gnawed 
places on the under- 
ground stem of the 
plant and the pres- 
ence of a protecting 
silken web or tube are 
the characters which, 
almost with certainty, 
identify the cause of 
the injury as a web- 
worm. The other type 
of injury by sod web- 
worms is that done 
to meadows, pas- 
tures, lawns, and 
grasslands of all 
kinds. Under normal 
conditions sod web- 
worms are grass feed- 
ers and will be found 
only in sod or grass 
clumps. In fact, the lig. 3.—Seedling corn plant showing silken nest of web- 
injury to corn de- worm attached to stem at right just below surface of 
scribed above is not 
normal to the habits of these insects and occurs only when sod or 
grasslands are plowed and planted to corn while the worms are still 
present in the soil. The injury to meadows and pastures is ordi- 
narily inconspicuous and the degree of such injury is practically im- 
possible to estimate in definite terms. That it is severe and a real 
factor in reducing the productivity of such lands may, however, be 
readily understood when it is realized that there are often many 
thousands of these worms to the acre, each cutting off and consuming 
several blades of grass every 24 hours. And they continue their de- 
