52 FIRST ANNUAL REPORT OF 



of a green worm that is found on raspberry leaves, and which passes 

 the winter under-ground, and develops into a four-winged fly (Se- 

 'ria rubi of my manuscript) in the spring ; I have known a dif- 

 ference of three months to occur between the issuing of the first and 

 last individuals of the same brood, all the larvas of which had entered 

 the ground within three days. It is also a well recorded tact, both in 

 this country and in Europe, that in lSb'8, owing, probably, to the un- 

 usual heat and drouth of the summer, very many insects which are 

 well known to usually pass the winter in the imperfect state, per- 

 fected themselves in the fall, and in some instance? produced a second 

 brood of larvae. Far be it from me to pronounce that there is no such 

 thing as rule in nature, and that we cannot, therefore, generalize ; I 

 simply assert that we frequently draw our lines too rigidly, and en- 

 deavor to make the facts come within them, instead of loosening and 

 allowing them to encompass the facts. It was thus that the Joint- 

 worm ily was for so long a time suspected to be a parasite instead of 

 the true culprit, because all the other species in the genus (Eary- 

 in hi it ?), to which it was supposed to belong, were known to be para- 

 sitic. For those who are not acquainted with the appearance of the 

 Plum Curculio, in iis different stages, I have prepared, at Figure IS, 

 correct and magnified portraits of the full-grown larva (a)] of the 

 pupa (b) into which the larva is transformed within a little cavity 

 underground, and of the perfect curculio (c). 



With this prelude I will now give what I believe to be facts in its 

 natural history, founded on my own observations of the past year, 

 and on the observations of others. I firmly believe : 



1 — That Plum Curculios are a most unmitigated nuisance, and, 

 though most beautiful objects under the microscope, the fruit-growers 

 of the United States, ii they had their own way about the matter, 

 would wish them swept from off the face of the Earth, at the risk 

 even of interfering with the "Harmony of Nature." 



2 — That they are more numerous in timbered regions than on the 

 prairie. 



3 — Thai '■.'■ ly and do fly during the heat of the day, and 



that cotton bandages around the trunk, and all like contrivances to 

 prevent tin ding the trees, are worse than useless, and a result 



only of their economy. 



4 — That by its punctures it causes the dreaded peach-rot to spread, 

 whenever that disease is prevalent, though it cannot possibly be the 

 first cause of the disease. The peach-rot is now pretty generally 

 acknowledged to be a contagious disease of a fungoid nature, and I 

 believe that the spores of this fungus, "a million of which might be 

 put upon the poinl of a stick whittled down to nothing," attach them- 

 selves more readily to fruit which has the skin abraded, and from 

 which the gum issues, than to whole or unpunctured fruit. With this 

 belief I made some effort to procure, for the benefit of my readers, a 

 synopsis of the growth of this fungus; but, alas! I find th: ' ig 



