57 



The motlis increased in nnmberfrom the tiino they were first observed 

 until, by the 3d of June, in the early evening, when the field lay between 

 the observer and the sun, a perfect cloud of tliein could be seen hover- 

 ing over the blossoms as far as the eye could reach. They wouUl spring 

 up from under the foot like grasshoppers in a meadow on a sunshiny 

 day. It was also noticed that they were pairing freely at this time. 



On the 24th of June an examination of 177 heads of clover taken 

 from the field before mentioned siiowed 91 heads infested with the cater- 

 pillar of the moth as against 80 not infested. Many of the larvic were 

 full grown and some were spinning their cocoons. The hay was cut 

 at this date. An examination the next day, June 25, of 48 clover 

 heads taken from scattered bunches on the college campus showed 8, 

 or 16§ per cent., of the whole infested. Examining 42 heads from a 

 different field, cut on the 23d and 24th of June, only 3, or 7 per cent., 

 were found infested. 



The damage was done by eating into the young florets and later into 

 the seed vessels, causing the heads to dry up and the flowers to shell 

 from the receptacles like chaff. 



The larva is a small, greenish white caterpillar, with a dark brown 

 head, about .25 to .30 of an inch long when full grown, many of them 

 becoming tinged with red toward the hinder extremity as they approach 

 the time of pupation. About the 24th of June the adults had nearly 

 all disappeared, a few stragglers only being found by diligent search. 

 Of a number of larvse preserved in a breeding cage the first pupa was 

 found July 14, but a visit the same day to the field before mentioned 

 proved the second brood of the adults to have already appeared. An 

 examination of dried bunches of hay left on the field disclosed some 

 larva? in the heads, which had spun their cocoons to pupate, from which 

 it is concluded that the caterpillars can live in the cut hay for a con- 

 siderable time if not hampered in their movements. An examination 

 of the hay from the same field stored in the barn showed all the larvse 

 to be dead. A dead pupa was also found, but nothing living. There 

 were no empty pupa cases found to indicate that any moths had 

 escaped from the hay thus stored. It seems certain, therefore, that 

 everything that was subjected to the pressure and heat incident to 

 storage was killed. The remedy, then, for this pest, which has caused 

 the destruction of probably 50 i)er cent of the clover seed in the field 

 observed, is to cut the hay soon after the first brood of larva? appears, 

 or in early June. The hay should be carefully cleaned from the field, 

 so that no larv?e will find harbor in stray bunches which have not been 

 gathered up. Scattered clover growiug by the roadsides and in the 

 fence corners should also he carefully mown at this time, and the heads 

 at least disposed of in some manner to insure the destruction of the 

 larv?e they may contain. This method can not but i)rove effective in 

 reducing the second brood of the moths, aud will also operate against 

 the clover-seed midge Gecidomyia leguminicola. 



