210 INSECT PESTS OF FARM, GARDEN AND ORCHARD 



trees become yellow and have a sickly appearance, as if affected 

 with a fungous disease. Especially upon the upper sides of the 

 tender leaves of clover the juices are extracted over irregular 

 areas, looking more or less like the burrows of some leaf-mining 

 larvae. Owing to the small size of the mites they may be doing 

 considerable damage to the foliage and yet remain unnoticed; 

 but in the egg stage the pest is much more readily detected and 

 attacked. In the more northern States the eggs are laid in the 

 fall, and do not hatch until the next spring. Further south, 

 however, the adult mites hibernate over winter. The eggs are 

 of a reddish color, laid upon the bark of trees, especially in the 

 crotches, and in the West are sometimes so thickly placed as to 

 cover considerable areas two or three layers deep. 



When the adult mites leave the clover-fields in the fall to 

 find hibernating quarters upon fruit-trees for the winter, they 

 often become quite a nuisance by invading dwelling-houses which 

 are in their path.- This is more particularly the case throughout 

 the Mississippi Valley. 



Remedies. When swarming into a house their progress may 

 be arrested by spraying the lower part of the building, walls, 

 etc., with pure kerosene as often as necessary. Inside the house 

 they may be destroyed by the use of pyrethrum powder (Persian 

 insect-powder), burning brimstone, or spraying with benzine, 

 care being taken not to bring the latter substance near the fire. 



The only practical way of protecting clover from the mite 

 !s by destroying the eggs and hibernating mites upon the fruit- 

 trees in winter. This may be done by burning all the prunings 

 and thoroughly spraying the trees with kerosene emulsion diluted 

 with five parts of water, or with miscible oils or lime-sulfur 

 mixture. Such a spraying will also protect the fruit-trees from 

 the mite, and will destroy numerous other insects, such as the 

 pear-leaf blister-mite, which hibernates upon the trees. Such 

 small insects, so minute as to usually escape notice, are often 

 responsible for a poor growth, and should be properly checked 

 whenever known to be injurious. 



