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Cut-worms are heavy bodied insects unalile to climb over smooth surfaces, 

 therefore surrounding a plant or tree with a liand of tin or even paper in 

 the ease of such plants as cabbages and tomatoes is an efficient means of 

 protection. Tin hands may easily be made by taking pieces of tin six inches 

 long by two and a half inches wide and bending them around a spade or 

 broom handle so as to form short tulies. In placing them around a plant the 

 two ends can be sprung apart to admit the stem and then the tube should be 

 jjressed a short distance into the ground. I have found this a useful means 

 of disposing of tomato and other cans. To prepare these easily the cans 

 need only be thrown into a bonfire, when the tops and bottoms fall off and 

 the sides become nnsoldered. The large piece of tin can then be u.sed whole 

 or may lie cut down the centre with a pair of shears, so as to form two bands. 

 It may he well to mention here that the two remedies so often mentioned 

 in newspapers, salt and lime, have proved quite worthless in our experiments 

 for preventing cut-worm injuries. 



Another excellent plan to prevent cut-worms a.scending fruit trees is to 

 cut cotton batting in strips about four inches wide iuid sufficiently long to go 

 round the trunk of the tree and to overlap .-in inch or two, according to the 

 size of the tree. These bands should be tied round the trees with twine on 

 the lower edge, the ujijier edge is then pulled down so as to form a sort of 

 umbrella-shaped obstruction, over which the cut-worms are unable to climb, 

 •especially if the edge of the cotton batting is a little teased out. — Report, 1906. 



Ciil-ironiix ill Oidin. 



Different kinds of cut- worms .-ittack grain cro]is during the spring and 

 sometimes eat them bare. The.v seem to be most numerous where weeds have 

 been allowed possession of the land during the previous autunui. The species 

 which has been most freipiently detected feeding ujion the small grains is the 

 Ked-backed cut-worm { I'linii/rotis urhrogaster. (Jn. I. Two other species, 

 however, when they oc<-ur, are nmch more difficult to reach, ln'cause they 

 feed chiefly ui>on roots and work almost entirely beneatli tlie surface. These 

 are the Glassy cut-worm {Hadcna dcrngidtri.r. lirace). and the Yellow- 

 headed cut-worm (Uadviui- (irrtioi. Bdv. ). These are of a dirty wliitisli 

 colour, very similar in general n]i])e;ir,-incc_ liut the former has a reddish-brown 

 head, and the body is tinged with liluish green, while the Yellow-headed cut- 

 '.'orm has a smoky-gray body, ,-iU(l the head and neck-shield are tawny-yellow. 

 The crops most attacke<l by these cut-worms are oats, wheat, corn, and grass 

 in meadows. 



Tiniirdicx. — When grain is found to lie attacked by cut-worms the fields 

 sho\dd at once be examined to discover if possible what species is at work. 

 If the (ait-worms are of a surface-feeding kind, like the Red-backed cut-worm, 

 they may frequently l>e ciaitrolled witli comparative ease by scattering 

 poisoned bran lightly through th(> grain, near the spots where the caterpillars 

 are most numerous, or ahead of them, where they are so numerous as to have 

 assumed the marching habit. If land is systematically kept clear of weecls 

 in autumn, there will seldom be trouble from cut-worms in the crop of the 

 following year. Prairie or sod land which is to be broken for seeding the 



