STATE rOMOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 8 1 



the honey which they carry to the hive and feed there to imma- 

 ture bees causes the death of the latter. A spraying of apple 

 trees after the petals have fallen brings about a thorough poison- 

 ing of the outer skin of the apple and the consequent death of 

 the young apple worms when they attempt to burrow into the 

 fruit. 



Throughout Alassachusetts — and I presume the same is true 

 in Maine — the unsightly webs of the tent caterpillar are only 

 too familiar objects in the spring months. Occasionally this 

 insect is an apple tree pest of the first order. The eggs are laid 

 in bands covered with varnish, on the twigs of apple or cherry 

 trees in July, by the reddish-brown parent moth. Here they 

 remain intact through the fall and winter, hatching the following 

 spring and producing young caterpillars which feed upon the 

 unfolding buds and leaves and soon spin a web in some conven- 

 ient fork of the branches. By the latter part of May or early 

 in June, these webs grow to remarkable proportions and their 

 hungry inmates swarm out over the trees, frequently devouring 

 all the foliage in their vicinity. The pupal stage of the insect 

 is passed within a yellow cocoon, in some sheltered spot, and by 

 the nn'ddle of Julv the moths emerge and deposit the eggs for 

 the next year's brood. Of course every farmer knows how 

 easily this insect may be disposed of by the destruction of the 

 egg-clusters during the winter. Where this work has been neg- 

 lected, the insects are easily destroyed by the use of an arsenical 

 spray. I do not advise the farmers to burn the webs of the 

 caterpillars — a practice which is too generally followed. I have 

 seen numbers of fine apple trees that have been badly injured by 

 the use of the torch in incompetent hands. Where it is impos- 

 sible or undesirable to spray, an al)lc-bodied man equipped with 

 a pair of leather mittens can easily crush the webs and destroy 

 the insects more effectually than where the torch is used. 



"Canker worm years" are of undesirable frequency through- 

 out the greater part of New England. The wingless female 

 parents of the canker worm ascend the trees both in the fall and 

 in the spring and deposit their eggs in masses on the branches. 

 From these eggs, by the time the leaves unfold, the young canker 

 worms develop in multitudes, the efifect of their feeding causing 

 the tree to appear as if burned. Fruit, of course, has no place 



