10 
species that attack and destroy it in different ways, and the injury and 
loss is very great. 
Necessarily I have given considerable time and study to unraveling 
the life histories of some of the more important ones, giving them that 
prominence in my report that their importance to the grower seem to 
warrant. 
THE CABBAGE PLUSIA. 
( Plusia brassicce Biley.) 
This is one of the most serious and destructive of cabbage insects. 
Prof. 0. Y. Biley first described it in his Second Missouri Beport, 1870, 
page 110. 
Distribution. — While, undoubtedly, originally indigenous to the South- 
ern States, it is now very generally distributed over most of the Eastern 
and Western States. In IT. S. Agricultural Beport for 1883, Professor 
Biley states that he has received it from Mississippi, Georgia, Florida, 
the Carolinas, Alabama, Texas, New Jersey, Missouri, Kansas, Nebraska, 
Virginia, and Maryland. 
Food Plants . — The food plants of the larvae, as given in same report, 
are Cabbage, Kale, Turnip, Tomato, Mignonette (Reseda), Dandelion 
( Taraxacum ), Dock ( Rumex ), Crepis, Clienopodium, Clover, Senecio scan- 
dens, Lettuce, and Celery. Professor Biley also says: 11 We have 
also found it in Florida feeding upon the Japan Quince (Cydonia japon- 
ica ), and it has been found in Washington upon same plant.” 
Life History. — The life history of this insect is treated in the Annual 
Beport of the Department for 1883, pp. 119-122, and it is figured at 
Plate I, figs. 2 and 2 a, and Plate XI, figs. 2, a, b, c. The different stages 
are described in Professor Biley’s Second Missouri Entomological Be- 
port, pp. 111-112. 
Number of Broods . — Professor Lintner, State Entomologist of New 
York, in treating of this species in his second report, page 92, says : 
“In its more northern extension there are two annual broods, for, from 
larvae taken in August, after about two weeks of pupation, Dr. Thomas 
has had the moths emerge on the 1st of September, which deposited 
their eggs for a second brood in October. In the Southern States there 
are probably four broods, for Mr. Grote took examples of the moths in 
Alabama during the last of February.” 
Here in Florida there are certainly not less than six broods, for I have 
taken the moths every month but the winter months, November, De- 
cember, and January. 
Its Injuries. — Not a cabbage patch visited by me this spring and sum- 
mer but was more or less damaged by the attacks of this terrible cab- 
bage pest, and the injury it does and the loss sustained by the trucker 
is immense. 
The very young begin by eating the fleshy portion of the leaves; as 
