190 



NATURE STUDY AND LIFE 



trees, generally within eighteen inches of the ground. 

 The eggs are brown, and almost seven hundred have been 

 counted in a single female. They are glued to the bark 

 and hatch in about a week, and the little borer immediately 

 crawls into a crack, bores down to the juicy inner bark and 



there remains for 

 about ten months, 

 feeding during 

 all but freezing 

 weather. It then 

 makes its brown 

 cocoon, generally 

 on the tree trunk 

 close to the 

 ground, and after 

 three weeks 

 emerges to repeat 

 the story. The 

 moths are day 

 fliers, are not at- 

 tracted to lights, 

 but visit flowers 

 for nectar or 

 pollen. 



The best way 

 to deal with the peach-tree borer" is to watch the trees 

 and as soon as the gummy exudation appears dig out the 

 larva with a knife. Peach trees heal up wounds readily, 

 and there need be no fear of injuring the tree as much 

 with the knife as the borer would without it. All peach 

 trees should be gone over very carefully in September, 



Fig. 80. 



Borer Signs around Base of Peach 

 Tree 



(Photograph by SHngerland) 



