RED SPIDER 221 



ing the Paris green into contact with the roots through the agency 

 of rains should be avoided. The bait is best placed in the field 

 at sundown in order that it may not become dried by the sun before 

 night, which is the chosen feeding time of cut-worms. 



Other insects which at times injure tobacco are: The cabbage 

 plusia, grasshoppers, white flies, and crickets. Naked snails or 

 "slugs" are at times injurious. The so-called cigarette beetle 

 works on stored tobacco and is combated by fumigation with car- 

 bon bisulfid. 



INSECTS AFFECTING THE COTTON PLANT 



The Cotton Boll-weevil. Undoubtedly this dark-gray snout 

 beetle (Anthoncmus grandis Boh.) is one of the most destructive 

 insects in America. Introduced from Mexico about 1891, it has 

 gradually spread over nearly the entire cotton belt in the southern 

 states, causing annually a loss of several million dollars. As the 

 name indicates, it works in the bolls of cotton, in which it lays its 

 eggs. Several broods occur in a season (Fig. 232). 



Control. Of all remedies and methods of control which entomol- 

 ogists and growers have tried, the best, if not the only dependable 

 means, consists in early planting, or in the use of early varieties, or 

 in both factors. These are coupled with the use of fertilizers and 

 thorough cultivation in an effort to hasten the maturing and 

 ripening of the crop. Plants should be placed at least four feet 

 apart. This allows the sunlight to reach infested squares which 

 have fallen to the ground, and kills some of the young larvae therein. 

 The burning or plowing under of infested plants before winter 

 will destroy the quarters where the adults try to hide for winter. 

 Intelligent crop rotations are also recommended. 



Red Spider (Tetranychus bimaculatus gloveri Bks. Harvey). 

 Although this is called "red spider," the females may vary in 

 color from red to yellow or green or dark brown. In the South 

 the whiter is passed on weeds or cultivated plants, notably the 

 violet, the mites migrating thence to young cotton plants. 



Injury. This mite, which goes under different specific names 

 and attacks a large variety of plants, 'may cause an immense 

 amount of damage to cotton (Figs. 233 and 234) (ree related spe- 

 cies, page 215). In 1912 it occasioned the loss of about three 

 hundred and ninety-four thousand dollars in South Carolina alone. 

 Basing estimates upon these figures, it is probable that "during 

 a severe red spider year the Southeast may suffer a loss of two 



