OTHER FOOD PLANTS. 81 



viduals and numbers, to be easily seen, these accounts will not convey a 

 wrong impression. For example, a planter informed the writer, in 

 reply to questions respecting a certain field, that the worms first appeared, 

 in it three days previous. It was a field adjoining his residence, through 

 which he passed every day, and was one to which, as he informed me, he 

 had paid special attention. On visiting the field I found it very badly 

 infested with cotton- worms which were then two-thirds grown, and hence 

 must have been more than three days old.* 



Although observers may fall into error respecting the time required 

 for the devastation of a field of cotton by this pest, exaggeration is 

 hardly possible respecting the completeness of the destruction which 

 sometimes occurs. We have repeatedly seen places in which the plants 

 were so completely stripped of their foliage that there were not left as 

 many uneaten leaves as there were stalks, a few dried and brown leaves 

 on the lower part of the plants being the only semblance of foliage left 

 on what, ten days previous, was a beautiful green field. In cases of 

 this kind, not only are all the green leaves eaten, but the young bolls 

 are also destroyed, and often the bark is gnawed from the small branches. 



The stopping of the growth of the plant is not the only loss which the 

 destruction of the foliage entails. Open cotton is frequently injured by 

 the dropping of the excrement of the larvae upon it. Much injury also 

 results from the premature opening of the bolls, caused by the destruc- 

 tion of the foliage. Not only is such cotton of inferior quality, but when, 

 in addition to the fully-developed bolls, many immature ones are made 

 to open, it is often impossible for the planters to pick the cotton before 

 much of it falls out upon the ground and is thus seriously damaged. 

 Immense losses sometimes occur in this way, when wind and rain closely 

 follow the destruction of the foliage by the worms. 



On the other hand, in some parts of the cotton belt notably the more 

 northern sections the advent of the cotton- worm is not dreaded. It 

 rarely reaches these regions till late in the season, and then the planters 

 consider the destruction of the foliage a benefit rather than otherwise, 

 as in this way the maturity of young bolls, which would otherwise be 

 destroyed by frost, is hastened. Sometimes, even in southern portions 

 of the cotton belt, in localities where the plant grows very rank if the 

 worms do not appear early, the destruction of the leaves late in the sea- 

 son is regarded as a source of profit. 



No well authenticated instance is recorded of the cotton-worm feed- 

 ing upon any plant except cotton.t Many experiments were tried to 



* We have seen that the time required for the cotton-worm to attain its growth 

 varies greatly, depending upon temperature. Hence it may be possible that under 

 unusual conditions a brood of worms might be developed so rapidly that they would 

 strip a rield in a few days after their first appearance. Still, under ordinary circum- 

 stances, this would not be the case. 



t P. Winifree, De Bow's Review, iv, 261 (1847), says : " In the West Indies they feed 

 promiscuously on the leaves of a plant there called the salve-bush ; this plant grows 

 about the height and its leaves are a good deal like the mullein of this country, having 

 a whitish color and a soft velvety feeling." 

 6 c I 



