66 



THE PRACTICAL ENTOMOLOGIST. 



wishes to protect from cutworms ; her notion is that 

 the worms will feed upon the manure in preference 

 to the plant. [This must be a mere notion, b. d. 

 w] 1 have observed where manure has been ap- 

 plied as a top-dressing early in the fall, as to rhu- 

 barb and asparagus, or as a mulch in summer to 

 fruit-trees, and not forked under in the fall, that 

 the following spring, soon after frost was out of 

 the ground, it would contain great quantities of 

 cutworms, sometimes so numerous and so small that 

 I think they must have been bred there. [Scarcely : 

 they hid under the old dry manure during the day. 

 B. D. W.] Hens make short work of them when 

 found in .such situations. Those who have no hens, 

 or who prohibit them from entering the garden, 

 may easily destroy the worms by first turning the 

 manure upside down, and then applying boiling 

 water from the roseofn watering can. I have also 

 found that numbers of moths may be captured and 

 destroyed, by leaving a window of an upper room 

 open during summer; and it has occurred to me 

 that if some safe lamp were placed in a milk pan 

 half full of water, on a chair, so as to be about level 

 with the opening in the window, this trap would 

 prove very efficient. Does any reader know any 

 better method of keeping under this pest, than those 

 stated above? If cutworms are so numerous and 

 annoying throughout the United States, as they 

 have been here the last two or three years, the 

 genius, who can invent some cheap and effective 

 apparatus to destroy moths by wholesale, would de- 

 serve to be held in everlasting remembrance, and 

 the nation could well afford to pay him a very large 

 pecuniary reward. 



[" Surgaring," with poisoned molasses will pro- 

 bably be found the cheapest and most effective and 

 most wholesale method of destroying the moths, 

 both of these Tree-cutworms and of ordinary cut- 

 worms. For directions, see Practical Entomo- 

 logist, II, p. 53. 1!. D. w.] 



ENTOMOLOGY RUN MAD. 



The following article, from the pen of an anony- 

 mous writer, appears in the North Carolina Rural 

 Journal for September 1866, and contains almost 

 as many errors as sentences. The author seems to 

 have confounded together four very distinct in- 

 sects. 1st. Some unknown species feeding on the 

 buds of plants, perhaps a Tree-cutworm (^Hndcna.) 

 (See Practical Entomologist, I, p. 85, and II, p. 

 64, 67.) 2d. ASpindle-wormburrowingin the stem 

 of the young corn, probably allied to the notorious 

 Gorti/na zrx. 3d. A larva boring the stem of the 

 hogweed, probably, like the Spindle-worm, that of 

 some moth, or it may be that of some Saw-fly, 

 (Teiithrcflo.) 4th. '-The active and sparkling fire- 

 fly," as he calls it, which must be some species of 

 Lightning-bug, (^Photitiu^ and allied genera,) as 

 the only other luminous genus of true insects, 

 (i^yro/)/w)ru.s,) belongs to the Click-beetles (^'/a^c 

 iamily), and is not found, I believe", further north 

 than Louisiana. Now, in the larva state, all these 

 "Lightning-bugs" are cannibal insects, preying 

 vipon various species of borers; and consequently 



a vegetable-feeding larva, such as he represents his 

 •' bud-worm" to be. could not change as he repre- 

 sents it to do, into a "fire-fly." 



The Bud Worm. 

 This little insect, whose r.'ipacity the farmer has so much 

 reason to regret, is not more than a hall' inch in length, 

 with a black or dark brown head, body of a white color. 

 The peculiarity of having a dark-colored head will serve 

 til identify .the worm in the earlier days of its growth, 

 but I have observed that the' head becomes of the same 

 color as the body, as the worm approaches maturity. Its 

 growth is quite ra2)id. but during the few days necessary 

 f.)r its maturity it will destroy a score of stalks of corn. 

 One fact that struck me with peculiar interest, is thatthe 

 ovum from which this worm is ]ircduced is hatched 

 during the fall, and the inseet attains to very nearly the 

 size of which wo see him in early spring, inclosed in the 

 center of a weed, (generally the hogweed.) The pith of 

 the weed seems to furni.sh his food. 'You may readily de- 

 tect the point at which the egg was deposited by the small 

 jierforation in the weed, and you may thence track him 

 for several inches by the delicate canal he has left 

 h 'hind. About the eighth day after leaving the place 

 of incubation, there appears a great change in his appear- 

 ance. The body -vvliich has grown to twice its original 

 diatneter and increased somewhat in length, becomes 

 marked with longitudinal streaks of a black color alter- 

 nating with white ones of the same width, the head as we 

 have said losing its peculiar color. The motions of the 

 worm now become sluggish, and there appears about the 

 upper third of the body, and on either side, an enlarge- 

 ment of the skin, resembling a puff in a lady's sleeve. 

 This indicates the point at which the w;ngs are soon to 

 protrude. The worm is now ready to make one of tte 

 clianges of insect life, and as if providing against a period 

 nf inactivity, he selects a large stalk of corn. A day is 

 now all that is necessary to effect the metamorphosis, and 

 instead of the loathsome budworm we now have the active 

 and sparkling fire-fly. This is the history of the bud- 

 worm obtained from careful observation and experiment. 

 But, of what is of vastly more importance, namely, a re- 

 medy against its ravages, I am sorry to say that I know 

 nothing. J. s. D. 



Commenting on the above is almost like comment- 

 ing on the Book of Mormon ; but it may perhaps 

 be worth while to point out a few of the more ob- 

 vious mistakes. 



1st. We are told that "the peculiarity of having 

 a dark-colored head will serve to identify the worm 

 in the earlier days of its growth." I know more 

 than a thousand larvEB that have this "peculiarity." 

 In fact, with a few exceptions, all boring larvfe have 

 a dark or reddish er yellowish head, and a pale 

 body. 



2nd. Speaking of the hogweed borer, we are in- 

 formed that "you maj readily detect the point at 

 which the egg was deposited by the small perfora- 

 tion in the weed." This is not the case with any 

 borer known to me. The minute hole by which 

 the egg is inserted, or by which the minute larva 

 cats his way in after hatching out from the egg, 

 always closes up and becomes undistinguishable. 

 The hole seen by this writer must have been that 

 made by almost all boring larva;, to afford a passage 

 for the perfect insect. 



3rd. The "great change" spoken of as occurring 

 in the same larva, after it has migrated from the 

 hogweed to the corn, is simply due to the hogweed 

 borerbeingan entirely distinct species from the borer 

 that inhabits the corn. Although many larvas 

 change color very remarkably as they progress to 

 maturity, yet it is absolutely incredible that a 

 larva when young, should be white with a dark 



