584 MISC. PUBLICATION 657, U. S. DEPT. OF AGRICULTURE 
contiguously in rows of 3 to 10 on the flattened surfaces of the pine 
needles of the previous year’s growth. The eggs hatch in the last 3 
weeks in May. The young larvae spin a loose webbing about them- 
selves and feed gregariously, cutting off the needles just above the 
bundle sheaths and pulling them into the webbing, until the needles 
are entirely consumed. In the later instars the larvae spin individual 
silken tubes about themselves along the twig. Considerable frass and 
needle fragments usually adhere to ) the outside of these tubes. Larvae 
may be found from early in May until late in June. The full-grown 
larvae drop to the ground and construct earthen cells about 2 or 3 
inches below the surface, in which they hibernate. Pupation takes 
place the following spring. 
Figure 169.—Dorsal and lateral views of larvae of Acantholyda erythrocephala, 
about X 4. 
The full-grown larva of Acantholyda (Itycorsia) zappei (Roh.), 
the nesting pine sawfly, is about 34 to 1 inch in length. The head is 
brown and the body green, with a dorsal stripe of a darker shade. 
This species occurs in Connecticut and other Northeastern States, but 
the limits of its range are not definitely known. Its food plants in- 
clude Austrian, jack, pitch, red, and Japanese red pines, but thus far 
it has never been reported as causing large-scale defoliation. ‘The 
adults emerge late in the spring, and “the females lay their crescent- 
shaped, pale yellowish eggs singly and externally on the dev eloping 
needles of the new erowth late in June or early in July. When a 
