Adelges abietis. 



If the twigs of a spruce-fir, or Christmas-tree, be carefully 

 examined during the month of April, the chances are very- 

 many that the foundress of the colony of aphides, which three 

 or four months later will be swarming on the same twigs, may 

 be seen occupied in depositing ova and in puncturing the axils 

 of the young expanding leaves. The queen, or foundress, has 

 hybernated during the winter, and upon the return of mild 

 weather and ascending sap, emerges a thin and wingless 

 shrivelled creature. By absorbing the sap her condition is 

 speedily changed to that of rotundity. At the conclusion of 

 oviposition she dies. The punctures made by her rostrum at 

 the axils of the young leaves cause a diversion of the sap, and 

 the bases of the needle-like leaves thicken and swell, forming 

 numerous cavities of which the larva; take possession. The 

 twig attacked forms an axis, around which the larval chambers 

 are arranged, each containing about thirty-five larvae. The 

 larvae, by the constant punctures made with their rostra to 

 suck the sap, cause the continual development of the growth. 

 During May they assume the pupal stage. Towards the end of 

 June they make their way through the gaping apertures of the 

 scales, crawl up the needles, emerge from the puparium as 

 imagines, and in twenty minutes or less can fly away. One 

 of these conglomerations of larval chambers may contain from 

 i,8oo to 2,000 insects. At the close of the summer these false 

 cones, as they are termed, dry, turn black, and several years will 

 elapse before disintegration is complete. 



The illustration is of specimens gathered at Hastings by the 

 author. 



