82 Lessons in Fruit Growing. 



In the plum and some other fruits, the female exposes lier 

 ■work by a crescent-shaped mark (d) about the point of 

 Qgg deposit. On the hatching of the ^^g., the larva feeds 

 upon the pulp of the fruit until it attains its growth, when 

 it leaves the fruit and descends into the ground 4 to 6 

 inches for transformation. More or less gum generally 

 exudes from the wounds made in the egg-laying, and in 

 the plum, the fruit usually drops before maturity; but in 

 cold and backward springs the egg-laying may be so far 

 retarded that the larvae are found in the ripe fruit. The 

 plum curculio is single brooded, and the beetle passes the 

 winter under'the loose bark of trees or in similar places. 



Preventive measures. Early in the season the beetle 

 feeds somewhat on the foliage, and hence may be destroyed 

 to a slight extent by spraying the tree with water contain- 

 ing an arsenite, but the number of beetles that may be thus 

 destroyed is not always sufficient to repay spraying for this 

 purpose alone. The so called "jarring process" is more 

 effectual. In this, advantage is taken of the stiffness in 

 the beetles caused by cold, to jar them from the tree upon 

 sheet-covered frames, where they may be killed. The trees 

 are gone over, usually in the earl}'' morning, with the cur- 

 culio catcher (Fig. 28), which is run beneath the tree so that 

 the trunk is near the 

 center of the sheet. 

 A stub, formed by 

 sawing off a small 

 branch of the tree, is 



then struck two or Fig. sT Curciilio catcher. 



three vigorous blows 



with a cushion-covered mallet, when the curculios, with 



other insects, drop on the sheet, whence they are swept into 



