IMPORTANT PECAN INSECTS AND THEIR CONTROL. 17 



from practically all the Southern States in which pecans are grown, 

 it probably ranks as a serious pest only in Florida and the southern 

 parts of Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, and Texas. The 

 insect occurs also in some of the Northern and Middle Western 

 States where the pecan is not grown, and here it subsists on the various 

 hickories. Generally speaking, the pecan leaf case-bearer is dis- 

 tributed over approximately the same territory as are its preferred 

 hosts , namely, the pecan and hickories. Evidently certain climatic f ac- 



FIG. 16. The pecan leaf case-bearer (Acrobasis nebuldla): Injury to young 

 pecan buds in spring by larvae. 



tors limit the destructiveness of this species, and because of these con- 

 ditions it has not been able, apparently, to become a pest in the 

 northern part of the pecan-growing sections. 



The most serious damage by the leaf case-bearer is done during the 

 early spring and is inflicted by the ''worms," which emerge from 

 their winter cases and feed voraciously upon the unfolding buds and 

 leaves. (Fig. 16.) These " worms," or larvae, are small at this time 

 and dark brown, but soon change to dark greenish as they feed upon 

 100737 Bull. 84317 3T 



