103 



INSECT NOTES FROM GEORGIA FOR THE YEAR 1903. 



Wilmox Newell, Atlanta, Ga. 



As in previous years, the San Jose scale has been the most serious 

 pest in Georgia and has received \>y far the most attention. Experi- 

 ments conducted by W. M. Scott, former State entomologist, have 

 shown the lime-sulphur-salt wash to be more effective and much safer 

 than the treatments with crude oil and kerosene. As a result, these 

 latter treatments have been for the most part abandoned by the com- 

 mercial peach growers, and the great majority of scale-infested 

 orchards in the State will the coming winter be sprayed with the lime- 

 sulphur-salt. In many of the larger orchards outfits have been pre- 

 pared for boiling the mixture by means of steam, these outfits in 

 many cases using boilers of from 15 to 30 horsepower. Several modi- 

 fications of the lime-sulphur-salt wash have been tested, but none 

 have been found as effective as the regular formula of 30 pounds 

 lime, 20 pounds sulphur, 15 pounds salt, and 60 gallons of water. 



The colony of Asiatic lady beetles (Chilocorus similis) secured by 

 Professor Scott from the Division of Entomology at Washington, D. C. , 

 in August, 1902, and introduced in a scale-infested orchard at Mar- 

 shall ville, Ga., has increased to a remarkable extent during the past 

 season. A number of colonies have been sent to other parts of the 

 State as well as to entomologists in other States. During the latter 

 part of the summer their beneficial work could be plainly seen in the 

 Marshall ville orchard. They did not, however, become abundant 

 enough to destroy the San Jose scale in proportion to the rapidity with 

 which the latter bred, so that the possibility of their successfully con- 

 trolling this pest is still a matter of conjecture. It was noted that 

 this species hibernated much earlier than the native species. By 

 October 16 very few adults and no larv?e or pupa? could be found 

 upon the trees, while up to November 1 most native Coccinellids were 

 plentiful. 



Next to the San Jose scale, the peach borer {Sanninoidea exitiosa) 

 is perhaps the most destructive insect pest occurring in the State. 

 Very few peach orchards can be found in which these insects are not 

 abundant. No effective remedy — aside from the tedious and expen- 

 sive "worming" — is at hand, and the only chance of effectively 

 reducing the numbers of this pest appears to be in the enforcement 

 of stringent laws for bird protection. 



The fruit-tree bark-beetle (Scolytus rugalosus), or " shot-hole borer," 

 as it is more commonly called in the South, occurs generally in the 

 peach orchards of the State, and while the damage is scattered, yet in 

 the aggregate it amounts to considerable. Our observations upon 

 this species in Georgia have not substantiated the popular idea that 

 this pest attacks only trees which have been weakened from other 



