248 



THE CEREALS IN AMERICA 



smooth, shining surface, varying in color from yellowish to reddish-browii. Thej 

 pupate in July and August, and transform to bsetles three or four weeks later. 

 The beetles remain in the soil and emerge the followln,g 

 spring. Eggs are then laid in the earth in grass land, 

 where they soon hatch, the larvae requiring at least two 

 years to become fully grown. The larvae are very de- 

 structive by attacking the seed in the ground before it is 

 sprouted, and also by eating and boring the roots and 

 stems of the young growing plant. The injury is likely 

 to be greater the second year, after sod has been broken 

 up. All cereal crops may be attacked. No successful 

 remedy has yet been proposed, although fall plowing is 

 believed to be helpful. When replanting injured maize 

 it is customary to put the new seed between the attacked 

 rows, which are left to stand as a, food supply until culti- 

 vation becomes necessary. 



Beetle and larva of wire- 

 worm, enlarged two 

 times. (After Forbes.) 



329. Cutworms. — There are at least fourteen dis- 

 tinct species of moths whose larvae have the cutworm 

 habit. The life history of the different species, of course, 

 varies somewhat, but in general their injuries and treatment are substantially the 

 same. The moths lay their eggs upon the leaves of grasses in meadows and pas- 

 tures and the larvae feed upon the growing vegetation. The fully grown cutworm 

 is one and one-quarter inches to two inches long and varies in color with the species 

 from dull brown to gray or green and is variously marked with longitudinal or oblique 

 stripes and dashes and dots. The moths lay their eggs during midsummer and 

 partially grown larvae pass the winter in the ground. Thus when grass lands, 

 especially of long standing, are plowed up and planted to maize, the cutworms, 

 being deprived of other vegetation, attack the young maize plants when only a few 

 inches high, cutting them off just above the ground. The larvae pupate d'iring late 

 spring and summer, some species on the fortieth parallel as early as the fourth week 

 in May, thus permitting late planted maize to escape their attacks. Late fall plow- 

 ing is measurably effective by disturbing and exposing the worms and by destroy- 

 ing the food on which they would feed during spring. They may also be poisoned 

 by a mixture of wheat bran, forty pounds ; molasses, two 

 quarts ; paris green, one pound, mixed with enough w^ater 

 to moisten. A tablespoon of this mixture placed near 

 each hill will attract the cutworms and prove fatal. 



330. White Grubs. — White grubs are the larvae of 

 May beetles or June bugs, of which a number of species 

 are known to attack maize. The beetles lay their eggs 

 mostly during June in the earth, commonly in grass 

 lands but not infrequently in maize land also. The eggs 

 hatch in ten to eighteen days and the grubs are supposed to live over two full years, 

 the complete life cycle being three years. White grubs do their injury by feeding 

 upon the roots of the young maize plant, sometimes causing immediate destruction, 



White grub, about natural 

 size, (After Forbes.) 



