106 CULTURE AND MANAGEMENT 



which were surrounded by a cluster of root suckers, 

 were in particular the greatest sufferers; and when 

 a tree had suckers on one side only, the worms were 

 found on that side of the tree. It is not improbable 

 that the suckers and leaves facilitate the operation of 

 depositing the eggs by affording a convenient shel- 

 ter for the fly or moth; but we are destitute of the 

 natural history of this insect. The suckers and 

 worms all being removed, I directed the wounds 

 made in the trees, and also the whole trunk near 

 the surface of the earth, to be covered with a mix- 

 ture of clay and cow dung, with a little hair to ren- 

 der it more adhesive ; and afterwards a circuit of 

 about three feet round each tree, to be covered 

 with tanner's bark, or refuse leather. 



SLUG WORM, OR NAKED SNAIL. 



It is from the accurate observation of professor 

 Peck, that we are enabled to present the reader 

 with the history of the slug worm, by which, of 

 late years, our fruit trees have been infested. These 

 reptiles make their appearance upon the leaves of 

 fruit trees, in the month of July, and our ingenious 

 professor has discovered, that they are the proge- 

 ny of a small black fly, which deposits its eggs in 

 the leaf in the months of May and June, and in 

 fourteen days after the deposit, the perfect slug is 

 found adhering and feeding on the leaves. It is of 

 an olive colour, with a slimy coat, and in the course 

 of twenty days, it throws off four skins, at nearly 

 equal periods; it remains in the fifth, or last vis- 

 cous skin, six days, and acquires its full growth ; it 

 then quits this fifth skin, which is left adhering to 

 the leaf, and appears in a clean yellow one, entirely 

 free from vicidity, and has so different an aspect 

 that it would not be supposed to be the same larva 1 . 

 After resting some hours, it proceeds slowly down the 

 tree to the earth, into which it enters to the depth 



