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NEW YORK STATE MUSEUM 



NOTES ON INJURIOUS INSECTS FOR 1899 



Several insects have appeared in unusual numbers or have attacked crops 

 not previously affected by them. The unusual abundance of the milk- 

 weed butterfly, Anosia plexippus Linn, may be mentioned, and 

 of the harvest fly, Cicada tibicen Linn. The destructive work on 

 sugar beets of the red-headed flea beetle, Systena frontalis 

 Foerst. is noteworthy. The beetles had evidently bred beside a large 

 field in Syracuse N. Y. where they were found in great numbers at the 

 time of my visit to the locality, and from there had invaded the patch, 

 giving it a brownish, ragged appearance. The pest was quickly con- 

 quered by spraying with paris green. In a few places in the central parts of 

 the state, American elms suffered severely from the larvae of a flea beetle, 

 Disonycha triangularis Say, which devoured the lower epider- 

 mis of the leaves. In August the foliage of these trees presented the dried, 

 brown appearance so familiar in the Hudson river valley in connection 

 with the attacks of the imported elm leaf beetle, Galerucella 

 luteola Mull. The pea crop on Long Island was ruined in places 

 by the attacks of a plant louse, since named Nectarophora 

 destructor Johns. One grower lost 20 acres and another 14 

 through the work of this pest. Another insect which attracted much 

 notice last summer was the so-called kissing bug, which in this state 

 must be considered the masked bedbug hunter, Opsicoetus per- 

 son at us Linn. Undoubtedly some persons were bitten by this insect, 

 but many of the newspaper stories rested on a very slender foundation 

 in fact, at least so far as the identity of the creature was concerned. 



Raspberry saw fly. The pale green, spiny larvae of this insect, 

 Monophadnoides rubi Harr. were received from Newark, Wayne 

 co. with the statement by C. H. Stuart that they had been very injurious 

 to raspberry plants. He wrote as follows: "The leaves of the infested 

 patch looked today [June 10] like those of a badly infested currant bush. 

 There is hardly a leaf in the field without several holes in it, and most of 

 the older leaves are eaten to threads." At Oneida, Madison co. two 

 acres were defoliated by this insect, as I was informed by J. T. Thompson. 

 They had occurred in small numbers the preceding season in the latter 

 locality. The badly eaten raspberry leaves received the latter part of 

 May from Mrs H. E. Robinson, of North Nassau, Rensselaer co. had 

 probably suffered from an attack of the same insect, though no larvae 

 were found on those' submitted for examination. 



