45 



Fig. 25. The Sta\k-hoTeT {Hudroecia nitela): a, adult; 6, half-grown 

 larva; c, mature larva in burrow; d, side of one of its segments; e, 

 pupa. All slightly enlarged. (Chittenden, U. S. Dept. of Agriculture.) 



die (Fig. 25, 6). It is about an inch long when full grown. The 

 general color varies from purplish brown to whitish brown, according 

 to age, and it is 

 marked with five 

 white stripes, one 

 running down the 

 middle of the 

 back, and two on 

 each side. These 

 s'de stripes are 

 interrupted, being 

 absent on the first 

 four segments 

 of the abdomen, 

 giving the larva 

 an appearance as 

 if it had been 

 pinched or injured 

 there. The stripes 

 nearly vanish 

 as the larva ma- 

 tures (Fig. 25, c). 



The head and top of the neck, and the leathery anal shield at the op- 

 posite end of the body are light reddish yellow, with a black stripe on 

 each side. 



Its presence in a young stalk of corn is very clearly indicated by the 

 wilting, breaking down, and death of the top, and by the presence of a 

 round hole in the side of the stalk (Fig. 25, c), plugged with the brown 

 excrement of the caterpillar within. 



It infests a great variety of other plants in a precisely similar way. 

 It is most noticeable in early spring in blue-grass, by roadsides or around 

 the borders of a field, its presence there being betrayed by the whiten- 

 ing of single heads of the grass while all the rest of the plant is green. 

 At this time it is of small size, and finds sufficient food within the grass 

 stem; but later it is compelled to resort to thicker-stemmed plants, and 

 it is at this time that it may appear in fields of corn. 



Going in usually from outside the field, its injury is, as a rule, almost 

 wholly confined to the outer rows. It rarely does any serious general 

 damage to corn, although it is reported to have once destroyed fifteen 

 acres of that crop near Elmira, Illinois, and it has also been occasionally 

 found injuriously abundant in fields of wheat. It is probable that where 

 the injury is not limited to the margins of the field, but is general through- 

 out its area, the eggs were laid in fall in grass or thick-stemmed weeds in 

 corn fields, where these have sprung up profusely after the corn has been 



