188 EXPERIMENTAL FARMS. 



VEGETABLES AND ROOT CROPS 



Cutworms. — The complaints of injury to garden vegetables and root crops have 

 been this year fewer than usual, most references to the ordinarj/ garden pests, such as 

 cutworms. Tarnished Plant-bug, plant-lice, etc., being merely to mention their absence. 

 In the province of Quebec, however, there was serious loss in some localities from cut- 

 worms, both in gardens and field crops. Very few specimens were submitted for ex- 

 amination, so only general instructions could be given. If correspondents would always 

 send in specimens with their inquiries it would be far easier for the Entomologist and 

 Botanist to give definite information and instructions, and he could thus be of more 

 service to inquirers than is now sometimes the case when no specimens are forwarded. 



"Quebec, June 14. — We are receiving from diffferent parts of the province of 

 Quebec letters informing us of the immense damage which is being done to vegetables 

 by the plague of cutworms, against which our farmers do not appear to have any means 

 of protecting themselves." — [S. Sylvestre, Secretary, Dept. Agr.] 



" Causapscal, Rimouski Co., 30th May. — I am instructed by the Directors of the 

 Agricultural Circle to send you the accompanying specimens of caterpillars which are 

 occurring here in large numbers and eating up completely our peas, at first the stems 

 and then even the seed pease in the earth. Farmers have been obliged to sow their 

 fields of peas over again. Can you tell us where this pest comes from, how long it will 

 continue to devastate our crops, what it will change to, and above all the best means of 

 destroying it? If we are not able to check this plague, our crop will be a total failure." 

 —[V. O. Morrissette.] 



As specimens accompanied this inquiry it was seen at once that they were the so- 

 called Black Army-worm {Noctua fennica, Tausch.) and had reached full-growth, so that 

 the application of a remedy was not necessary. These caterpillars were also somewhat 

 abundant in gardens at Ottawa, where they attacked every kind of vegetables, and also to 

 some extent in clover fields. This insect is one which from time to time appears suddenly 

 in large numbei's, and then does a good deal of harm. In the last stage of its growth it 

 is a voracious caterpillar which eats indiscriminately almost every kind of vegetation. 

 Prof. Lugger, who treats of it under the name of the Erratic Army-worm, when record- 

 ing an outbreak which occurred in the State of Minnesota, says that : " The caterpillars 

 devoured every green thing upon the face of the ground. They preferred, however, 

 such plants as were bitter, hence the foliage of cherries, willows, poplars and sumachs 

 was the first to be eaten. After these nearly all others were devoured." 



From my own observations of several occurrences of this insect at Ottawa I believe 

 its natural food plants to be the Leguminosse — cultivated peas and clover being par- 

 ticularly relished. The early maturing of the caterpillars (generally by the end of May 

 or very early in June) frequently prevents the injuries of this insect from being as 

 serious as they might be and actually often seem to be. In 1891 a three-acre field of 

 peas upon the Central Experimental Farm was swept bare by an ai'my of these cater- 

 pillars. The damage was stopped promptly by spraying a strip 5U feet wide ahead of 

 the caterpillars with Paris green, one pound in 100 gallons of water, to which 4 pounds 

 of soap had been added to make the solution adhere to the pease. This was applied 

 willi knapsack sprayers. Although the pea plants were eaten down entirely on thi'ee 

 acre's of the field mentioned, owing to the injury being done so early, the plants threw 

 out fresh roots and gave actually a better crop than an equal area in the uninjured 

 portion of the field. 



Professor Lugger gives a similar instance in his Second Annual Report, as follows : 

 "N(jr was the actual damage done very great, as all the wild plants soon recovered and 

 made a denser growth. The cereals which had been cut down to the very ground, 

 assisted by the moist warm days which followed this invasion, not only recuperated 

 but were in some cases even improved as they stooled better than those not cut by 

 the worms." 



