236 Forty- fifth Report on the State Museum. 



Turnips are liable to attack by being eaten into around the 

 neck of the plant until it is detached, or by its separate leaves 

 being cut off and drawn into holes near the plant. 



To onions they are at times so destructive as to ruin entire 

 crops. In one field of four acres in Chautauqua county, N. Y., 

 upon which onions had been grown for sixty years, the worms 

 were dug out and killed in almost incredible numbers — to the 

 amount of " bushels," in some years, it is stated. 



A remarkable attack was made upon onions, in Groshen, Orange 

 county, ]S T . Y., the present year, where several hundreds of acres 

 of drained swamp-land are devoted to their culture. The worms 

 appeared in myriads, in June, as soon as the onions had started, — 

 first eating them from their tips downward, but later develop- 

 ing the true cut- worm habit in severing the stalks. The species 

 was believed to be Agrotis maleflda, a southern form, not hitherto 

 noticed injuriously so far north. [On rearing the perfect insect it 

 proved to be Agrotis messoria Harris.] 



The tender stems of young beans furnish tempting food, and 

 every one who has grown them knows the frequency with which 

 they are found, in the morning, with severed stems, showing the 

 operation of the cut-worm. 



In portions of Canada, clover suffered severely from a formid- 

 able attack of a caterpillar which was thought, at first, to be 

 the army-worm, but which, upon rearing the moth, proved to be 

 one of the cut-worms, Agrotis fenniea. 



Tobacco plants ■, are often cut off in the month of June. In 

 West Meriden, Conn., from one row of 180 plants, 214 of the 

 worms were taken and killed. 



They frequently attack and destroy flowering plants in our 

 gardens, as hyacinths, pansies, carnations, nasturtiums, phlox, 

 asters, balsams, and many others. 



Among other garden and field crops, to which they are destruc- 

 tive, may be mentioned pease, beets, potatoes, tomatoes, pumpkins, 

 melons, and squashes. 



Natural enemies.— The large size of the cut- worms, their hairh^ss 

 bodies, and no provision for protection except their concealment 

 by day, render them attractive and an easy prey to their many 



