THE LARCH SHOOT MOTH. 1 95 



27. The Larch Shoot Moth^ {Argyresthia {Tinea) 

 laevigatella). 



( With Plate.) 



By R. Stewart MacDougall, M.A., D.Sc. 



Still another enemy of the larch in Britain falls to be recorded 

 in the tiny moth, Argyresthia laevigatella. This moth is not 

 to be found in the British lists. Professor Somerville, in 

 sending me some material showing the work of the caterpillar, 

 in the month of May, wrote : " This is a very serious enemy 

 in the neighbourhood of Oxford, and, I believe, has not hitherto 

 been recorded in Britain." From this material I bred out five 

 moths. I have also received from Colonel Bailey examples of 

 the damage done by the caterpillars in Bagley Woods, Oxford. 

 Professor Somerville records, in the Quarterly Journal of Forestry,^ 

 that in the district round Oxford larches up to twenty years 

 of age have been much injured during the past autumn and 

 spring; and in the same number of the Quarterly Journal of 

 Forestry, Mr John Bennet records the caterpillars as destruc- 

 tive on young larch near Basingtoke in Hampshire. 



Argyresthia laevigatella is one of the Micro-Lepidoptera, some 

 of which, belonging to the genera Retinia, Tortrix, and 

 Coleophora, are already well known as harmful forest insects 

 very troublesome to combat. It belongs to the family Tineidce 

 and the genus Argyresthia. Of this genus there are more than 

 twenty recorded species in Britain. Generally it may be said 

 that Argyresthia caterpillars feed in buds, shoots, or fruits. 

 Amongst trees, one or other species of Argyresthia has been 

 found infesting birch, alder, hazel, oak, beech, goat willow, 

 horse-chestnut, apple, cherry, sloe, juniper, and now to these 

 in Britain we must add the species on larch. 



A. laevigatella must be considered a very harmful enemy, 

 both because it attacks young larches and because a single 

 caterpillar is able to accomplish the destruction of a whole 

 year's shoot. 



^ Reproduced from the fotirnal of the Board of Agriculture for October 

 1907, by kind permission of the Controller of His Majesty's Stationery Office. 

 2 Quarterly journal of Forestry, vol. i., No. 3, July 1907. 



