142 MASSACHUSETTS AGRICULTURE. 



THE CANKER WORM. 



ESSEX. 



From the Report of the Committee. 



The Committee on the Destruction of the Canker Worm 

 respectfully report, that there has been but one entry for the 

 Society's premium of $100 offered for a new, cheap and ef- 

 fectual protection against the ravages of that destroyer of the 

 orchardist's hopes. It is presumed that the Society expects a 

 better, cheaper and more effectual method of protection than 

 is now known, in order to entile the claimant to the award. 



That now offered by Mr. A. P. Noyes, of Middleton, is an 

 arrangement of prepared hair cloth, invented by Mr. Charles 

 P. Johnson. 



Mr. Noyes applied this invention to some trees of one of the 

 Committee, at an average cost of fifty cents per tree, in order 

 to test its value as a protection against the grub of the canker 

 worm. By putting a strip of tarred paper, with printers' ink 

 upon it, above the hair cloth, it has been found that they passed 

 through or over it and were caught by the ink, thereby proving 

 the wortlilessness of that invention. 



Tiie canker worm, that has been so destructive to the apple 

 orchards of New England, has been closely observed, and its 

 habits have been studied by your Committee and others, in 

 order to protect themselves from its ravages. It has been no- 

 ticed, that the grub commences breaking forth from its chrysalis 

 form, after the first freeze, usually about the first of November. 

 The females, which are wingless, proceed directly from the 

 ground to the trunk of the tree, and commence their ascent. 

 They continue coming from the ground, as the frost will per- 

 mit, until April ; generally in greater numbers in tiie spring 

 than in the autumn. The males, which have wings, are more 

 tardy in making their appearance ; and the proportion of males 

 (never so numerous as the females) is much greater in the 

 spring. The female, having broken ground, ascends tlie tree 

 more or less ra})idly, according as the weather is mild ; being 

 benumbed and motionless in cold nights and days, but ready for 

 a fresh start upward in a warm day. The males are more ac- 



