At least one insect devotes itself to pruning ofif twigs 

 and small branches of various trees. It is called the 

 oak. and maple pruner, and its work may be easily known 

 by the wilting tips in late summer and later by the fallen 

 branches, each with a clean-cut end and usually con- 

 taining the white, legless carpenter grub resting in a 

 burrow in the middle of the twig. 



The leaf feeders are known to many. The elm leaf 

 beetle and its voracious grub destroys the foliage of 

 thousands of elms each season, the affected trees show- 

 ing only brown skeletons of leaves in midsummer. This 

 pest, like a number of our more destructive insects, 

 is small, relatively unat- 

 tractive and a native of 

 Europe. It has been 

 found that over one-half 

 of the more injurious in- 

 sects of America have 

 been brought into this 

 country from some other 

 land. 



Dainty plumes, like 

 those of the ostrich, deli- 

 cate tufts or brushes of 

 hairs and brilliant yellow, 

 red and black colors make 

 the caterpillar of the white- 

 marked tussock moth a 

 beautiful object, whether 

 seen with the unaided eye 

 or viewed through a mag- 

 nifying glass. The male 

 moth has plumed feelers or antennae and thick tufts of 

 hairs on its forelegs, while the poor female is very plain 

 and does not possess even wings. The eggs are placed in 

 a large, white mass on the cocoon and may be easily re- 

 moved and burned. The spread of this pest is accom- 

 plislied mostly by the caterpillars crawling from tree to tree 

 and is therefore quite limited. This insect sometimes 

 becomes very abundant and the caterpillars eat almost 

 everything in sight and strip the leaves from horse- 

 chestnut, linden, elm and maple trees in cities and villages. 



A number of other leaf-eating caterpillars, some very 

 destructive, may be found on trees, and at any time we 

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