232 INSECT PESTS OF FARM, GARDEN AND ORCHARD 



ferred. Thus the rows are more open, the work of the worms 

 is more readily detected and the poison more easily applied. 



Other Caterpillars Injuring the Foliage 



Several of our common caterpillars which ordinarily feed upon 

 various weeds frequently attack cotton foliage in restricted local- 

 ities and do more or less serious damage. ' They may be readily 

 controlled by keeping down the weeds upon which they normally 

 feed and multiply and by dusting the foliage as for the cotton 

 worm as soon as they are noticed upon the cotton in any numbers. 



Among the more common of these leaf-eating caterpillars 

 is the Garden Webworm* (see page 363), which may be recognized 

 by the fine silken web which it spins over the young plants. 

 Another is the White-lined Sphinx Caterpillar,! a yellowish- 

 green caterpillar with black eye-spots and faint stripes, varying 

 to blackish with yellow spots, and distinguishable from most 

 other cotton caterpillars by the horn, characteristic of sphingid 

 caterpillars, at the tip of the abdomen. The Salt-marsh Cater- 

 pillar! which is one of our best-known " woolly bear" caterpil- 

 lars, covered with black and red hairs, has frequently stripped 

 cotton of foliage in Texas, as does the Fall Army Worm (see page 

 114), when it becomes locally overabundant. Many other species 

 might be mentioned which do more or less local injury. 



The Cotton Square-borer 



Just as the cotton squares commence to form they are often 

 bored into by a small green caterpillar which many planters 

 consider a stage of the bollworm and which others have called 

 the "sharpshooter." This injury is often quite serious on a 

 small area, as we have seen 10 per cent of the stalks entirely 

 denuded of squares in small fields in Texas where this insect was 

 abundant. The little caterpillars hollow out the squares in the 

 same manner as does the bollworm, often destroying all of those 

 on a plant knee-high and even boring into the tender stalk. The 

 caterpillars are bright green, oval, decidedly flattened, covered 

 with short hairs which give them a velvety appearance, and with 



* Loxostege similalis Guen. Family Pyralidce. 

 f Deilephila lineata Fab. Family Sphingidce. 

 j Estigmene acrcea Drury. Family Arctiidce. 

 Uranotes melinus Hbn. Family" Lyccenidce.. 



