23 



This species infests almost every shrub and tree ordinarily grown 

 in the garden, although it is not equally destructive on all. It does 

 mot attack evergreens, is rarely found on privet— never in numbers 

 enough to be injurious — and seldom occurs on raspberry or blackberry 

 so as to be troublesome. On all fruit trees, except cherry and quince, 

 it is destructive; Osage orange, Pyrus japonica, purple beech and 

 even Citrus trifoliata are seriously attacked and the Osage orange 

 and Pyrus japonica are veritable nests in which the scale breeds and 

 from which it may extend in every direction. 



Shade trees, generallj^, are subject to attack ; but except where they 

 are young no material injury is caused. Young European elms 

 may suffer severely, willows of all kinds are likely to be infested 

 and cut leaf and Kilmarnocks are frequently killed. Maples may 

 become infested and the silver maples sometimes considerably so; 

 but I have yet to find a maple of any kind along the streets or in 

 gardens that has been badly infested after it reached any considerable 

 size. In fact, none of the ordinarj^ shade trees have, in piy ex- 

 perience, become sufficiently infested by this insect to make it of 

 any account as a shade tree species. Tliis is fortunate in view of the 

 difficulty of dealing with it and limits the work that is to be done 

 to fruit and ornamentals in the gardens. 



The winter is passed in the half-grown condition, covered by a 

 black scale. In spring growth is resumed and, somewhere during 

 the early or middle part of May, males appear. They remain about 

 for a day or two only, fertilize the females and disappear. The fe- 

 males grow slowly, and not until the 10th of June, in the latitude of 

 'New Brunswick, do we find larvae. In South Jersey the insects begin 

 breeding two or three days earlier and in the more northern parts of 

 the State the 15th is nearer to the ordinary date when reproduction 

 begins. 



The larvae are small, sulphur-yellow atoms, which are born alive, 

 and each breeding female bears from six to eight daily for several 

 weeks in succession. Usualh', within twenty-four hours, the larvae 

 set, and almost . immediately a whitish film forms over the surface. 

 This is the first scale, and at almost any time after midsummer an 

 infested tree will show moving larvae, the almost snow-white recent 

 sets and every stage from that point through a gray to a black scale. 

 From the time the larvae first sets to the time when it is sexually 

 mature and ready to reproduce is a little less than five weeks, and 



