INSECTS, FUNGI, PLANT DISEASES, ETC. 139 



set, in which it drops an egg. From this is hatched a 

 small, white, footless worm, which bores into the fruit, 

 causing it to drop prematurely from the tree. The worm 

 enters the ground, and in three or four weeks comes out, 

 and the successive broods attack the plum, apricot, 

 cherry, nectarine, and peach, until the fruit ripens. Their 

 incisions have been found in the limbs of the pear tree. 

 The beetle, if discovered, feigus death, and can hardly be 

 distinguished from the dried flower buds by careless ob- 

 servers. Picking or sweeping up the fruit as fast as it 

 drops, and boiling it for pigs, before the worm can enter 

 the earth has been found beneficial; likewise jarring the 

 tree (by striking sharply with a mallet on the stump of 

 a limb removed for the purpose) as soon as the fruit is the 

 size of a pea, and collecting the insects on a white sheet 

 as they fall, and destroying them. As the insects are 

 torpid in the morning, that is the best time for the opera- 

 tion, which should be kept up uutil the fruit begins to 

 ripen. Plant all stone fruits in an enclosure by them- 

 selves in which pigs and poultry are admitted ; these will 

 collect the fruit as fast as it falls, and tread the ground 

 firmly together, so that it is not easy for the insects to 

 enter it. None of these methods will be fully effectual 

 if there are neglected trees near by from which the insect 

 may emigrate. The most reliable of them is jarring the 

 trees, and destroying the insects daily; the next is giving 

 access to a large flock of ducks and chickens, which, de- 

 stroying the perfect insect, are a much more efficient 

 remedy than the pigs alone. 



The Squash- Vine Borer (Melittia satyriniformis, 

 Hbn.). — This insect feeds on the interior of the stem of 

 the squash, and its presence is not detected until it has 

 been in the stem some time, and has grown to a well- 

 developed larva. The leaves of the plant show the 

 damage being done by the insect by wilting, and the 



