STATE AGRICULTURAL SOCIETY. 
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of a dull reddish color with a black head and neck. It subsists 
upon the old effete matters of the nest, or perhaps consumes the 
shells of the chrysalids after the moths or their parasites have 
come from them, for cocoons frequently occur from which these 
shells have disappeared. 
For destroying these caterpillars a variety of measures are re¬ 
sorted to by different persons in all parts of our country. Whilst 
some of these are more or less efficacious others are puerile and 
worthless, and some do the worms more benefit than harm. 
I have known persons to content themselves with simply 
thrusting a stick into the nest and tearing it asunder and knock¬ 
ing or shaking the worms to the ground, thinking that few of 
them would be able to find their way up the tree again and that 
at least a part of them would perish from starvation. Such per¬ 
sons have no correct conceptions of the distances which these 
caterpillars can travel and the variety of leaves on which they 
can subsist. 
I have known other persons to tear open the nest and pom- 
water into it till it was saturated, thinking this operation drowned 
the worms. And in former years I -was myself accustomed to 
cut off the limbs containing nests upon the choke cherries in my 
meadow and throw them into the adjacent creek, supposing the 
worms would thus be drowned and become food lor fish. I have 
since learned that in this act I was no more wise than the sages 
of Gotham when they sat about destroying an eel by drowning 
it. I have known one of these worms after being immersed un¬ 
der water two hours revive and crawl away on becoming dry. 
Nor is hot water more efficacious. Several nests of quite young 
caterpillars, through which water that was near the boiling point 
was profusely poured were next day found all alive and appa¬ 
rently unharmed by the operation. 
I have sometimes poured soap suds into the nests and upon the 
worms when exposed upon the limbs and leaves. When wetted 
in this manner they shrink up and fall to the ground, dead as I 
have supposed, but I am not certain that none of them have re¬ 
vived again when thus treated. Some persons have used ley in 
the same manner, and this is undoubtedly more destructive. A 
swab charged with spirits of turpentine or with whale oil soap 
