60 MARKET GARDENING. 



are the grubs of snap-beetles, brown-black insects which, 

 when laid over on their backs, have the singular power 

 of snapping and springing violently to their feet. The 

 writer has frequently seen grains of corn a week after 

 planting, bored out to a shell, and containing as many 

 as a dozen worms ravenously finishing the remainder of 

 the grain. 



Cut Worm. Cut worms are the larvae of various 

 species of night moths which deposit their eggs late in 

 the summer. When hatched, the worms enter the 

 ground and remain in a torpid state all winter. In the 

 spring they appear as naked, greasy, smooth caterpillars, 

 ravenously attacking the seed, roots and stems of almost 

 any young vegetable, and when disturbed, coiling 

 quickly into a ball. The best method of killing them 

 is to catch them by digging. They are sometimes 

 destroyed by Paris green sprinkled on small bunches of 

 freshly cut grass laid upon the surface of the soil where 

 the worms are known to be. White hellebore has been 

 found effective in the destruction of this pest. 



Colorado Potato Beetle. The Colorado potato 

 beetle is, perhaps, one of the best recognized of insect 

 pests, being large in size, and found in every locality. 

 Its favorite foods are the leaves of the potato, tomato 

 and egg plant. But it is readily destroyed with Paris 

 green. 



Squash Beetle. The striped squash beetle, prey- 

 ing upon cucumbers and melons, is an insect a little 

 over a quarter of an inch long, with a black and yellow 

 jacket bearing three parallel black bands. The full 

 grown beetle appears in the middle of spring, just in 

 time to catch the plants as they sprout, eating the young 

 leaves as they develop, so that the gardener almost gives 

 up in despair of ever securing plants with too well devel- 

 oped leaves, at which stage they are usually considered 

 proof against the beetles ; but this is not always the case, 



