41 
number the trees should be sprayed, if the fruit is very young, with 
the Paris-green or London-purple solution. If they occur in injurious 
numbers later in the year they can be jarred down upon sheets satu- 
rated with kerosene. 
Great Damage by the Cottonwood Borer.— In our last annual 
report we devoted a few pages to the Cottonwood Leaf Beetle (Plagio- 
dera scripta ), which was surprisingly abundant during last season, and 
incidentally mentioned the Cottonwood Borer ( Saperda calcarata), with 
the statement that its injuries had not of late been at all comparable 
with those of the former insect. During the season of 1885, however, 
not a single complaint of the Leaf Beetle has been received, while the 
work of the Borer in parts of Dakota has been very noticeable. Dr. J. 
Y. Lauderdale, post surgeon at Fort Sully, sent us specimens of the 
larvm on July 25, with the statement that they were committing “fear- 
ful ravages” among the cottonwoods at the post. “Trees of ten and 
twelve years’ growth are dying from the top limbs to the ground.” 
This borer is a very difficult insect to fight, piercing the trunk of the 
tree, as it often does, midway up amongst the branches. There is really 
no remedy save cutting out the pupm in April or May, or the larvae ear- 
lier. The beetles make their appearance in June. Where a tree is so 
badly damaged that it has become unsightly, it should be cut down and 
burned before the beetles issue. 
Leptocoris trivittata injuring Apples (Plate I, fig. 5.). — This 
bug is quite a common species and has been found in a great variety of 
situations. It is characteristically a plant-feeder, but has never been 
known to occur in such numbers as to do much damage to any culti- 
vated crop. It has been found in large flowers like magnolia, covered 
with pollen, and occurs in summer on the stems and leaves of annual 
plants, which it probably punctures. In August of the present year, 
however, specimens were sent to us by Mr. A. L. Siler, of Kanch, Kane 
County, Utah,. as injuring fruit at Kanab, the county seat of the same 
county. Mr. Siler’s attention was called to them by the postmaster, 
Mr. B. L. Young, who stated that these insects were destroying their 
fruit crop, eating the fruit as fast as it ripened. On one tree which Mr. 
Siler examined, and which bore apples of a medium size, they were 
present in enormous numbers, and every apple that he could see was 
covered with the bugs. They were stated to have bred on the Box Elder 
shade trees (Negundo acer aides). 
We wrote Mr. Siler, advising him to have the trees sprayed with a 
dilute kerosene emulsion by means of a force-pump with a spray-nozzle. 
The breeding of the bugs on Box Elder, and their desertion of this tree 
for the ripening fruit, makes the case precisely similar to that of the 
Bed Bug or Cotton Stainer (Dysdercus suturellus , to which it is moreover 
quite closely related) in Florida, as where cotton and oranges are grown 
near together the bugs desert the cotton, on which they breed, for the 
more attractive fruit. There the bugs are attracted to piles of cotton- 
