28 



INSECTS INJURIOUS TO THE APPLE. 



yield sweet fruit. This woolly-louse is very common in 

 Europe, especially in Germany, the north of France, and 

 England, where it is more destructive than in this country, 

 and, although generally known there under the name of 

 the "American Blight,^^ it is believed to be indigenous to 

 Europe, and to have been originally brought from Europe 

 to America. It appears to thrive only in comparatively cold 

 climates, and in this country occurs in this form most abun- 

 dantly in the New England States. 



Under each of the little patches of down there is usually 

 found one large female with her young. When fully grown 

 the female is nearly one-tenth of an inch long, oval in form, 

 with black head and feet, dusky legs and antennae, and yel- 

 lowish abdomen. She is covered with a white, mealy powder, 

 and has a tuft of white down growing upon the hinder part of 

 her back, which is easily detached. During the summer the 

 parents are wingless, and the young are produced alive, but 

 about the middle of October, among the wingless specimens, 

 appear a considerable number both of males and females with 

 wings, and these have but little of the downy substance upon 

 their bodies, which are nearly black and rather plump. The 



fore wings are large, 

 and about twice as 

 long as the narrower 

 hind wings. In Fig. 

 14 the winged insect is 

 represented much mag- 

 nified ; also a group of 

 the larvae magnified, 

 and an apple-twig, 

 natural size, showing 

 one of the openings in 

 the bark caused by this 

 insect. The winged 

 females fly from tree to tree to deposit eggs for another gen- 

 eration the following spring, — a fact which should induce 



