90 INSECTS AFFECTING VEGETATION 



that the young maggots may not be left in the stumps of the canes. 

 (Bui. 62, Wash. Agr. Exp. Sta.) 



The Raspberry Byturus. The cause of the injury is a small 

 brown beetle, belonging to the same family as the buffalo carpet 

 moth and the museum pests. This one, however, has the unusual 

 habit of confining its attack to living plant tissues, instead of feed- 

 ing on animal fibre and tissues as its near relatives do. This small 

 brown beetle, the Raspberry Byturus, feeds upon the young leaves 

 and buds of the raspberry, and the larvae develop in the head upon 

 which the berry is borne, causing the affected berries to ripen 

 earlier, and this tends to make them small and unfit for market. 



Its injuries are severe, but these are usually confined to small 

 and somewhat local areas. It probably has some insect enemies 

 which hold it in check, in most cases, as it seems to disappear after 

 a few years of abundance, during which it inflicts severe injury on 

 red raspberries. The beetles are pale yellowish-brown' in color 

 when they first emerge, but get much darker in a few hours. They 

 often fly to the tender leaves and buds of the raspberry bushes be- 

 fore they have assumed their normal color, and immediately com- 

 mence feeding on the tender leaves, and on the under sides of lone 

 buds, and on the inner contiguous sides of clustered buds. In the 

 latter case where the buds are touching each other, they do the most 

 damage, as they often eat out the sexual organs of all the adjacent 

 buds in a cluster. Most of the tender leaves are partly skeletonized, 

 and sometimes completely so, when the beetles are plentiful. These 

 worms are plump and cylindrical, slightly tapered at each end, and 

 nearly one-fourth of an inch in length when full grown. They are 

 white, each segment having on the back a broad, pale, tawny yellow 

 band, occupying more than half its surface, and being also furnished 

 with a few short, erect, whitish hairs. 



'Spray heavily with arsenate of lead just before the emergence 

 of the beetles and this will destroy most of the beetles and materi- 

 ally lessen their injury to the flower buds. In connection with 

 this, thorough cultivation late in the fall, close up around the 

 bushes, will destroy many of the pupae, or expose them to the 

 freezes and thaws of winter, thereby causing their destruction. 

 Spraying with kerosene emulsion is only to be recommended where 

 the beetles are already very numerous, and the spraying with ar- 

 senate of lead has been deferred until after the beetles have appeared 

 in large numbers; even then, the arsenate of lead will be fully as 

 effective and last for a much longer period, but in extreme cases 

 the two may be used together. Bordeaux may be added for fungous 

 diseases, and will help to hold the arsenate of lead on the foliage 

 and buds, making the spray slightly more efficient than if arsen- 

 ate of lead were used alone. (Bui. 202 Ohio Agr. Exp. Sta.) 



The Tree-Crickets. Many times one finds long rows of punc- 

 tures on the sides of raspberry and blackberry canes, and also on 

 the new growth of peach trees. When such a twig is split along 

 the row of punctures, each hole is found to contain an egg, the 

 egg of a tree-cricket. The rows vary in length from one to several 



