THE PRACTICAL ENTOMOLOGIST. 



115 



correct your informant as to the way of depositing 

 the egg. She first bores the hole as spoken of, not 

 straight in, hut slanting backwards, so that the egg 

 cavity is just below the skin, pushing her snout 

 down under herself. She then turns round and 

 drops her egg into the hole which she has bored; 

 turns again, pushes the egg home, and cuts the 

 usual crescent in front of the hole, so as to under- 

 mine the egg, and leave it in a kind of flap formed 

 by the little piece of the flesh of the fruit which 

 she has undermined. Can her object be to wilt 

 the piece around the egg and prevent the growing 

 fruit from crushing it ? 



After watching two go through the work, I call- 

 ed on Mr. Orton, with a plum in which an egg 

 was, without the crescent, and wc adjourned to his 

 cherry-tree and saw two more do it. So intent is 

 she on her work, that Mr. Orton cut ofi" the cherry 

 with scissors and brought it down without stopping 

 her. We did not time her, but I should think it 

 must take at least five minutes to place an egg. 



Rbmarks ev B. D. W. — On careful examination, I am 

 satisfied that Mr. Hill is correct in the above statement; 

 and I have little doubt that his mode of accounting for 

 the peculiarities of the operation is the true one. The 

 statement in the Practical Entomologist, to which he 

 refers, (Vol. II, p. 76) was based, not upon my own per- 

 sonal observations, but upon what I found recorded in 

 books. 



THE APPLE WOEM. 



( Carpocapsa pomonella.) 



This imported pest is ruining the apples and 

 pears in all quarters this year. From Pennsylva- 

 nia to Iowa, all accounts agree that it was never so 

 destructive before. What is very remarkable, the 

 same species, as I have experimentallj' proved by 

 breeding the moth, has attacked the native Crab- 

 apples near Hock Island, 111. I have proved in 

 the same manner that the species attacking the 

 pear is identical with that which attacks the apple. 



SPINDLE-WOEMS. 



Dr. Harris long ago described the transforma- 

 tions of a worm, that commonly bores the stem of 

 young Indian Corn, and is known as the ''Spindle- 

 worm," naming the moth which is produced from 

 it Gorti/na (jichatodei) zese. He further states 

 that it is not confined to Indian corn, but some- 

 times bores the pith of the Elder, and sometimes 

 the stem of the Dahlia, (^inj- Jns., pp. 138 — 9.) 



In the Prairie Farmer of Feb. 23, 1867, Mr. 

 Riley has for the first time described the prepara- 

 tory states of the moth, which had been previously 

 named and described by the great French Ento- 

 mologist Guenee, as Gortyna nitela. He found the 

 larva of this moth to bore the stems of the Dahlia 

 and Aster, and probably supposing it to be pecu- 

 liar to these plants, he has named it the " Dahlia and 

 Aster stalk-borer." Like Harris's species, how- 

 ever, it inhabits both the stem of the Dahlia and 

 the stalk of our Indian corn. For from a larva found 

 in a corn-stalk I bred many years ago, on the 4th of 

 September, the very same species of moth that Mr. 

 Riley obtained in the fore part of September from 

 Dahlia and Aster stems. The pupa is remarkable 



for not having, like the pupa of most other moths, 

 a simple thorn at its tail, but a pair of slender 

 thorns horizontally arranged, each about l-16th 

 inch long, which the in.sect when alive has the 

 power of opening out in the form of an inverted V, 

 or at discretion shutting them together so as to 

 appear like a single thorn. This arrangement no 

 doubt enables it to work its way out of the corn- 

 stalk with more facility, preparatory to its bursting 

 forth in the moth state ; just as the hoof of an ox, 

 which is capable of spreading open in a fork, does 

 not sink so deep in a mud-hole as the hoof of a 

 mule, which is about the same size, but is one solid 

 piece. 



The difference in the habits of the true Spindle- 

 worm of Harris and this other Corn-stalk borer 

 appears to be this : The former usually attacks 

 the corn-stem when it is quite young, and before it 

 shoots much upwards ; the latter attacks the corn- 

 stem, as a general rule, after it has shot up to some 

 considerable height. The distinction, however, 

 between the two is practically of no importance ; 

 for both are equally destructive to the crop, and 

 both should be slain without mercy wherever they 

 are found. 



The curious inquirer may perhaps ask, how a 

 moth which comes out in September, like Mr. 

 Riley's insect, can manage to propagate its species, 

 seeing that corn is an annual plant, and Dahlias 

 die down to the root every winter. Manifestly it 

 would be no use for the moth to attach its eggs to 

 Dahlia stalks or corn stalks in September ; for long 

 before the larva could hatch out from the egg and 

 attain any size, the stalks would be dead, dried up 

 and destroyed. But in this, as in many similar 

 cases, for example in the case of the common 

 "Curculio," the perfect insect must, I think, live 

 through the winter in the perfect state; and by the 

 few that survive till the following spring the eggs 

 are deposited in the course of the spring, on the 

 young corn and young Dahlia plants, whence the 

 crop of borers for the following year takes its ori- 

 gin. Doubtless the great bulk of them perish in 

 the winter; for it is in the winter that insectivor- 

 ous animals are the hardest pushed for food, and 

 ransack every hole and corner where an unfortunate 

 moth attempts to hide itself But for this beauti- 

 ful provision of nature, and supposing the moth 

 came out in the spring, it would be almost impos-- 

 sible to grow corn ; and where we now find one 

 corn-stalk infested by the worm, we should then 

 find almost every stalk in a field of corn bored up 

 and worthless. 



When we are disposed to grumble at the severity 

 of our winters, and to wish that spring and sum- 

 mer could last all the year round, with flowers ever 

 blooming and crops ever growing, we should recol- 

 lect that one chief check would, in that event, be 

 removed from the multiplication of noxious insects. 

 For example, but very few house-flics escape 

 through the winter to propagate the brood in the 

 succeeding spring. But if we had perpetual sum- 

 mer all the year, they would increase in a won- 

 derfully rapid geometric progression from one year 



