Treatment 

 Because of the size which these worms attain, their net count should rate as 

 that of cutworms (see page 3). A spray of 6 pounds of dry lead arsenate in 100 

 gallons of water, 300 gallons to the acre, should be used when they hatch. 



Chain-Spotted Geometer ^o 



Neglected bogs with a dense growth of birches on the surrounding upland, 

 usually areas that never are flooded, occasionally have this spanworm crawl onto 



them in such numbers that the vines are browned 

 for some distance from the margin. The worms 

 often are reduced greatly by parasites and a fungus 

 disease. -lo A few of them appear on most dry bogs 

 yearly. Severe local outbreaks occurred in the 

 Cape Cod cranberry region in 1927 and 1934. 



Distribution and Food Plants 



This species ranges through the Atlantic States 

 and southeastern Canada and west to Colorado. 

 Gray birch seems to be its favorite food plant, but it 

 'tten defoliates alder, ash, low blueberry, dwarf 

 blueberry, swamp blueberry, male berry, wild black 

 dierry, bayberry, sweet fern, black huckleberry, 

 dangleberry, wild indigo'*!, red maple, white maple, 

 witherod, sheep laurel, scrub oak, meadow-sweet, 

 poplar, red spruce, tamarack, white pine and willow. 

 It also feeds on raspberry, blackberry, beach plum, 

 locust, goldenrod, sweet gale, hazelnut, poison ivy, 

 juniper, apple, pear, cranberry, rhodora, sedges, 

 grasses, and other plants. It sometimes is an impor- 

 tant pest in the blueberry fields of Maine. 



Description and Seasonal History 



THE WORM 



The worms appear in early summer and develop 

 slowly, maturing in late July and early August. They 

 get to be nearly an inch and a half long. As they 

 mature they have the habit of hanging straight and 

 still, head downward (fig. 32), during the day. 

 They seem to feed mostly in the evening or at night. 

 They are yellow, with round black spots on the head, 

 the neck shield, the outer sides of the prolegs, and 

 the very hind end. About thirty-two deep rusty- 

 brown lines run along the body, some above, some 

 below. There is a row of conspicuous white spots 

 along each side, mostly above the spiracles, most of 

 them bordered with one black spot in front and 

 another behind. 



THE PUPA 



The worms pupate in early and mid-August. 

 The pupa is white, marked with black and yellow. 



CHAIN-SPOTTED 

 GEOMETER 

 Fig. 32. Worm. Much en- 

 larged. 



3* Cingilia catenaria (Dru.). 



*" Caused by Entomophthora aulicae (Reich.). 



^ Baptisia tinctoria (L.) R. Br. 



[44} 



