80 
AGRICULTURAL REPORT. 
their places, they protrude their heads, the first three segments of the 
body, and six legs, from one end of the case ; but, when the insects 
wish to rest, each case is fastened by a few threads to the leaf or 
branch, and they retreat within. When shaken from the tree hv 
an accident or by high winds, the worms are able to suspend them- 
selves by means of small threads, and hang in the air ; hence the 
name. When young, they are often blown from tree to tree, and 
thus carried to a considerable distance from the place where they 
were hatched. 
The males and their cases are much smaller than those of the fe 
males, the worm being only about an inch in length. The first three 
segments of the body are whitish, marked with black lines and spots, 
the segments where they join are brownish; the head is marked with 
wavy lines of black on a white ground; the rest of the body is of a 
dirty, blackish-green. It has six pectoral feet, by means of which it 
moves from leaf to leaf, with its body and case, the latter either per- 
pendicularly suspended in the air or dragged by the worm from be- 
hind. There are eight very small ventral, and two anal feet, by 
means of which it clings to the inside of the case. The chrysalis 
measures about three-quarters of an inch in length, and contains the 
rudiments of wings, legs, head, and antennae, like other moths, and is 
of a dark-brown. The perfect moth comes out in autumn, and mea 
sures across the expanded wings about an inch and three-twentieths 
Its body is downy, and of a blackish-brown ; the wings arc semi 
transparent, and scantily clothed with blackish scales, which art 
blackest on the margins and veins ; the antennae are covered at their 
tips, and are doubly feathered from the base to beyond the middle. 
The female is much larger than the male, and never leaves her case, 
but changes into the perfect insect in the shell of the chrysalis, and 
only emerges from it when the eggs are laid within. The young, 
after leaving their maternal case, in the spring, immediately com- 
mence their cases, and spread over the native tree or any others that 
may happen to stand near. 
These insects are a great nuisance wherever 'they once get estab- 
lished, as they are exceedingly prolific. One female chrysalis case, 
which was dissected, contained seven hundred and ninety eggs, while 
others have been found to contain nearly a thousand. 
These pests are very rarely seen on the cotton-plant, and even 
when such is the case, they may have been blown there from the ce- 
dars, maples, or other deciduous-leaved trees in the woods on the 
edges of the plantations. They are the more particularly mentioned 
here, from the fact that, if taken in time, they may easily be exter- 
minated on deciduous-leaved shade-trees ; for, as I have before stated, 
the female cases contain all the eggs, which may be seen in winter 
hanging on the branches when the leaves have fallen, and even are' 
large enough to be distinguished when on evergreens. Tt would 
therefore require but little trouble to pull them off in the autumn and 
winter, and burn them, so that neither males nor females should 
escape. If this course were pursued two or three years in succession, 
there would not be so many complaints in our cities about the drop- 
worms destroying the foliage of the trees. 
