92 DECIDUOUS FRUIT INSECTS AND INSECTICIDES. 



A few years ago the Missouri fruit growers suffered considerable 

 loss on account of this same leaf-roller. 



Because of the increasing economic importance of this insect the 

 Bureau of Entomology started investigations in 1911 at Espanola, 

 N. Mex., with which work the writer was charged, under the direc- 

 tion of Mr. A. L. Quaintance. During the season of 1911 little was 

 accomplished owing to the stress of work along other lines in fruit 

 sections that were not troubled with the leaf-roller. On account of 

 the seriousness of the outbreak at Canon City, Colo., it was decided 

 to maintain a temporary field station at that place during 1912 for 

 conducting orchard spraying experiments and life-history studies of 

 the insect. The investigations during this time have shown the 

 value of certain practical measures for the control of this pest, and 

 have resulted in the obtaining of considerable data on its life history. 

 The object of the present publication is to give as much information 

 as is now available about the leaf-roller and methods forits control. 



The writer wishes especially to thank the orchardists of Colorado 

 and New Mexico who have assisted in this work. 



HISTORY. 



The fruit-tree leaf-roller was first described by Walker in 1863 

 under the name Retinia argyrospila, from material collected in Geor- 

 gia. In 1869 it was first recognized in this country by Robinson as 

 doing damage, and was redescribed as a new species, Tortrix furvana. 

 The following year (1870) Packard described it as a new species, 

 naming it Tortrix v-signatana and giving its distribution as " Maine 

 to Georgia and Texas and Missouri," and its food plants as black 

 walnut, maple, cherry, and horse-chestnut. Packard also gave a 

 description of its life history and food plants in the Fifth Report of 

 the United States Entomological Commission, pages 192, 195, 329, 

 425, 530, and 655. In an article in Insect Life, Volume III, page 

 19, by Riley and Howard, this species is mentioned as a rose pest. 

 Lintner included it in his Eleventh Report of the State Entomologist 

 of New York (1896) as one of the 356 species of insects that were 

 enemies of the apple. Gillette, in Bulletin No. 26 of the Division of 

 Entomology, United States Department of Agriculture (1900), men- 

 tions it as a general feeder, and in the Thirteenth Annual Report of 

 the Colorado Experiment Station (1900), page 123, it is also men- 

 tioned. In Bulletin No. 27 of the Division of Entomology (1901), page 

 88, Chittenden refers to it as affecting the rose. Holland, in "The 

 Moth Book," page 422, plate 48, fig. 34, discusses this species, and 

 it is included in Dyar's List of North American Lepidoptera, page 

 480, with its distribution limited to California and Colorado. In 

 Bulletin No. 38 of the Division of Entomology, page 36, Mr. A. N. 

 Caudell gives an account of it as infesting ash in Colorado. Horsfall, 



