266 INSECT PESTS OF FARM, GARDEN AND ORCHARD 



or boll. As many as fifteen larvae have been found in a boll. 

 The squares are greatly preferred as food and as places for deposit- 

 ing eggs. As long as a supply of squares is present the bolls are 

 not damaged to any serious extent. The bolls, therefore, have 

 a fair chance to develop as long as squares are being formed. 

 Whenever frost or other unfavorable weather causes the plants 

 to cease putting on squares, the weevils attack the bolls. A 



FIG. 196. Cotton squares broken open, showing the boll weevil larvae within 



enlarged. 



conservative estimate of the possible progeny of a single pair 

 of weevils during a season beginning on June 20, and extending 

 to November 4, is 12,755,100." Hunter. Although the weevil 

 may develop from egg to adult in two or three weeks, it requires 

 an average of about forty-three days for a complete generation, 

 and there are probably not over four or five generations in a 

 season. 



With the first killing frosts, most of the immature stages 

 developing are killed, though in south Texas they often develop 



