THE INSECTS OF JULY. 207 



the "White-faced wasp," is our largest species, are now com- 

 pleting their nests, and feeding their young with flies. The 

 Solitary wasp (Odynerus albophaleratus) fills its' earthen cells* 

 * with minute caterpillars, which it paralyzes with its poisonous 

 sting. A group of mud-cells, each stored with food for the 

 single larva within, w r e once, found concealed in a deserted nest 

 of the American Tent caterpillar. Numerous species of Wood 

 wasps (Crabronidae) are engaged in tunnelling the stems of the 

 blackbeny, the elder, and syringa, and enlarging and refitting 

 old nail holes, and burrowing in rotten wood, storing their cells 

 with flies, caterpillars, aphides and spiders, according to the 

 habit of each species. Eumenes fraterna, which attaches its 

 single, large, thin-walled cell of mud to the stems of plants, is, 

 according to Dr. T. W. Harris, known to store it with Canker 

 worms. Pelopreus, the Mud-dauber, is now building its earthen 

 cells, plastering them on 

 old rafters and stone walls. 



The Saw flies (Ten- 

 thrcdo), etc., abound in our 

 gardens this month. The 

 Selandria vitis attacks the 

 vine, while Selandria rosa3, 

 the Rose slug, injures the 

 rose. The disgusting Pear 

 slug- worm (S. cerasi), often 253< Imported Cabbage Butterfly, 

 live twenty to thirty on a leaf, eating the parenchyma, or softer 

 tissues, leaving the blighted leaf. The leaves should be sprin- 

 kled with a mixture of whale-oil soap and water, in the propor- 

 tion of two pounds of soap to fifteen gallons of water. 



Among the butterflies, Melitaea Ismeria, in the south, and M. 

 Harris!!, in the north, are sometimes seen. A second brood of 

 Colias Philodice, the common sulphur-yellow butterfly, appears, 

 and Pieris oleracea visits turnip-patches. It lays its eggs in 

 June on the leaves, and the full-grown, dark-green, hairy larva 

 may be found in August. The Pieris rapa3, or imported cabbage 

 butterfly (Fig. 253, male) is now also abundant. Its green 

 hairy larva is fearfully prevalent about Boston and New York. 

 The last of the month a new brood of Grapta comma appears, 

 and a second brood of the larva of Chrysophauus Americanus 

 may be found on the sorrel. 



The larvae of Pyrrarctia Isabella hatch out the first week in 



