50 NEW YORK STATE MUSEUM 
though it has not been possible to determine the limits closely. 
Specimens of partly grown and full-grown larvae and a number of 
cocoons were received from Nyack, July 18th. The material clearly 
indicated that feeding had been in progress for some weeks and estab- 
lished the fact that there are two if not three broods of this insect in 
New York State. A common parasite of some of the smaller leaf 
feeders, namely, Exorista pyste Walk., was reared from the 
material. This encourages the hope that eventually native enemies 
of allied or associated leaf feeders will prove of considerable service 
in preventing the undue multiplication of this recently introduced 
insect. 
Quince curculio (Conotrachelus crataegi Walsh). 
The erratic appearance of this curculio has long been a matter of 
record, though so far as the writer recalls, nothing has appeared 
showing a great variation in emergence the same season. Several 
quince curculios were received May 31st from A. B. Clarke and Son, 
Milton, Ulster county, accompanied by the statement that they were 
very injurious to pears. The curculios were feeding actively upon 
the young fruit transmitted with the communication, eating deep 
holes into the sides of the pears. These holes were characteristic 
feeding punctures, each being circular, with a diameter a little less 
than one-sixteenth of an inch and opening into an irregular cavity 
with a diameter of about one-eighth of an inch. Subsequent 
correspondence developed the fact that quince bushes were in the 
near vicinity and the attack upon pears was probably accidental 
and due either to the lack of quinces or to the fact that the fruit 
had not sufficiently developed. <A similar change of food habit in 
the plum curculio to adjacent crab apples, serious injury resulting 
to the latter, has been observed in earlier years. 
The above was followed by a report from L. F. Strickland, 
inspector of the State Department of Agriculture, announcing the 
first appearance of quince curculios in the vicinity of Lockport, 
Niagara county, July oth. This latter is about the time curculios 
usually appear in the western part of the State, though as evidenced 
by earlier records, occasionally there are wide departures from this 
presumably somewhat normal date of emergence. The climatic and 
other conditions in the Hudson valley and the western part of the 
State do not vary sufficiently to explain this difference of 5 weeks in 
the appearance of the adults, though they might easily account for a 
range of a week or 10 days. Evidently the quince curculio is likely 
to issue from the soil during a considerable period and since the most 
effective method of controlling the pest is by spraying just after the 
