THE INSECT WORLD. 



195 



The ' ' apple-twig borer, ' ' Aviphicerus bicaudatuSy is about the 

 only species needing especial remark, and this beetle bores into 

 small apple- twigs in early spring, entering close to a bud and 

 making a channel several inches in length, apparently for food 

 and shelter merely. It remains in these burrows a short time 

 only, and then lays its eggs in the dead or dying roots of ' ' cat- 



FiG. 183. 



Apple-twig borer, Atnphicerus bicaudatus .—a, beetle, from above ; b, same, in outline, from 

 side ; d, larva ; g, pupa ; h, same in larval burrow ; c, e^f, structural details. 



brier," or " greenbrier" {Smilax sp.), or in dead shoots of 

 grape. The insects rarely appear in troublesome numbers, and 

 then good practice is to look after neglected vineyards or grape 

 tangles in near-by woods, and after brier thickets, which latter 

 are an abomination at best and should be destroyed. 



There are other Serricorn families, small both in size and in 

 the number of species they contain, but they are mostly rare, of 

 no economic importance, and need not be referred to here even 

 by name. 



