478 



not prevented, may eventually do muck injury. A correspondent at 

 Eicbmoud, Virginia, writes that the elm, persimmon, &c., have been 

 much injured in that neighborhood. Mr. G. F. B. Leigbton, of JSTorfolk, 

 Virginia, states that the pear, hickory, elm, and persimmon are attacked 

 in bis vicinity ; but that the persimmon receives the greatest injury. 

 The beetle that thus girdles the twigs is the perfect insect of the 

 so-called " twig-girdler," Oncicleres cingidatus, Say, (Fig. 1,) 

 a medium-sized, long-horned beetle, of a chestnut-brown color, 

 and having a broad lighter-colored band across the wing- 

 covers. The female beetle first makes a perforation in a 

 branch, generally just below a bud ; she then deposits an egg 

 in this perforation, in one case even making as many as six 

 Xierforatious, in which eggs were deposited below the buds in a 

 single branch, not more than a foot in length, sent by Mr. 

 Leighton. 



After the insect has deposited her eggs, she then i)roceeds 

 to gnaw all around the branch, thus forming a, circular cut or 

 incision, about one-eighth to one-tenth of an inch in width, 

 below the place where the eggs are deposited, so that the 

 exterior part or end dies ; the larva, when hatched, feeds on the dead 

 wood, which sort of food appears to be essential to its growth. The 

 principal injury is said to be done in August and September. They 

 have also been found to injure walnut and apple as well as the trees 

 above mentioned. 



A great number of the perfect beetles that had just changed were 

 found in Maryland in twigs broken from a large hickory tree, and lying 

 on the ground beneath it. The best way to eradicate this insect is to cut 

 off all such branches and twigs as have the least api)earance of having 

 been girdled, and to gather up all fallen branches on the ground and to 

 burn them immediately, as the eggs or larvse of the next year's genera- 

 tion are contained in these twigs, and, if allowed to remain undisturbed, 

 would produce a race of beetles next season which would girdle all the 

 trees in the neighborhood. The best time to prune off the infested 

 branches is after the leaves have fallen from the trees, as the injury can 

 be more plainly seen than when the tree is in full leaf. 



There is another long-horned brownish beetle which also cuts off the 

 branches of oak, apple, peach, hickory, and chest- 

 nut. This beetle, which is known as the " oak-pruner," 

 Elapliidion viUosum, Fab., (Fig. 2,) [Stenocoruspiitator of 

 Peck,) does not make the incision from the outside of 

 the branch like the twig-girdler above mentioned, but 

 thelarvacutsthetwigfrom the inside. The egg is depos- 

 ited in July on a twig near the extremity of a branch 

 The larva, when hatched, penetrates into the wood, and 

 forms a cylindrical burrow several inches in length 

 in the interior of the branch, and, when full grown, eats away parts 

 of the wood of the branch in which it resides, from the inside, leaving 

 only the bark untouched, so that these branches are broken off in 

 autumn by the first strong wind, and fall to the earth with the larvae 

 yet in them. Professor Peck considered that this was done in order that 

 the branch might retain sufficient moisture from lying on the damp ground 

 to enable the pupa and insect to be perfectly developed. If this insect 

 should increase so as to -become very injurious, it may readily be de- 

 stroyed by gathering up all fallen branches under the trees in winter or 

 spring, before the i^erfeet beetle is developed, and burning them immedi- 

 ately. If such fallen branches are examined in early spring, they will 



Fig. 2. 



