29 
bers in ‘‘exempt” fields. I believe, too, that killing the cane is due, not 
to the injury in the pith, but to the injury done under the bark. Be- 
yond this, the history of the insect is well kuown; but I am not aware 
that the gall formation has been as fully observed. Of course the rem- 
edy is obvious. Cutting the galls out thoroughly in early spring and 
burning the cuttings is certain. This is already practiced by our best 
fruit growers, and they are not much troubled. Unfortunately there are 
many who seem unable to understand their own interests, and will de- 
lay cutting or refuse to burn. Some fields, too, belong to men of other 
occupations, and as they become unprofitable, they allow them to go to 
ruin and to become breeding places for all sorts of pests, fungous and 
insect. 
Next in order, and indeed sometimes even worse, is the larva of a 
Sesiid, probably Bembecia marginata, Harr. The eggsof this insect, which 
Ihave not yet seen, are laid late in August orin September. The young 
larva hatches that same fall, and in the following spring is found in 
canes of the previous year’s growth, boring only a short distance up 
from the roots. It is then less than half an inch long and of a faint 
reddish tint, which it loses as the summer advances. In July it leaves 
the cane on which usually no fruit has set, and attacks a new shoot, 
eating around the base and burrowing up between bark and wood. 
The shoot wilts, but the larva seems not to travel more until the follow- 
ing spring. It is then an inch long, white in color, and with a brown 
head. It eats at the crown until the new shoots are large and vigorous, 
and early in July the wilting shoot in infested fields indicate the where- 
abouts of the larve. They pupate in August, one pupa newly formed 
being found on the 10th, and a number on the 23d, but at these dates 
no imago was yet noticed. One pupa had wriggled out through the 
stem at the latter date, apparently ready to transform. The insect is 
important because it cuts two years’ growth of infested hills. The remedy 
is also mechanical. It consists in cutting the shoots as they wilt close 
to the crown, and destroying the contained larva. 
Sometimes in June a hill will suddenly wilt and die as if burnt. 
Search will in all cases reveal an enormous longicorn larva, which I 
make out to be that of Prionus laticollis. In some old fields it is very 
mischievous, boring huge channels in the main root. [am not aware 
that this has been heretofore noted as infesting blackberries, and simply 
record the habit. 
Another insect infesting growing canes escaped me during the pres- 
ent season because unexpected and unnoticed. In cutting some new 
shoots I found them marked, through the pith from base nearly to tip, 
a distance of three or four feet, by a larval channel. The new canes 
had been already topped a first time and 1 missed the culprit. Insome 
fields not yet topped I found that the borer had emerged or had been 
parasitized, fragments only remaining, which seemed to prove it Lepi- 
dopterous. No apparent damage was done by the insect and none of 
the bored stems died. 
