STATE AGRICULTURAL SOCIETY. 
861 
ARMY WORM. ITS CHANGE TO A PUPA AND A MILLER. ITS NAME. 
could be found anywhere about the spots where there had been 
millions of them only a few days before. But now that more 
knowledge with respect to insects and their habits has become 
diffused in our country, we have had numerous persons this year 
who have ferreted out their retreats, whereby it is at last well 
ascertained what becomes of them. 
When they have got their growth and finished feeding, the 
worms crawl into the ground to the depth of about two inches, 
and in two or three days change to pupae or chrysalides—that 
is, their skin breaks open and out of it there comes a much harder 
body, shaped somewhat like an egg, of a shining chestnut red 
color. This lies dormant in the ground nearly three weeks, when 
the outer shell-like covering cracks apart and a miller or moth 
crawls out of it and comes up out of the ground, which is the 
insect in its perfect state—the creature which lays the eggs to 
produce another crop of these worms. 
It probably, like other moths which are related to it, places 
its eggs at the roots of grass. 
Heretofore it had never been ascertained what insect this army 
worm was. It had merely been conjectured in Massachusetts in 
1817 that it was the common cut-worm of our gardens, and from 
all the information we had respecting it, this seemed to be the 
most plausible opinion that could be formed respecting it. Spe¬ 
cimens of the moth were sent to me, from distant parts of the 
country, first from different persons in Illinois, and soon after 
from Massachusetts, very much as though I was referred to by 
common consent to decide what this insect was. I ascertained 
it to be a species which had been scientifically described in Eng¬ 
land, fifty years ago, from a specimen which had been obtained 
in this country, its technical name being Leucania unipuncta. It 
therefore was not one of the cut-worm moths, as we had conjec¬ 
tured it to be, but a grass moth. Of the genus Leucania to which 
it belongs, we have over a dozen species in the State of New York, 
several of them being quite common. They are those tarnished 
white and cream colored millers which are so common in our 
meadows and pastures, and which we frequently may see flitting 
aside in great numbers when the scythe of the mower sweeps 
away from them the grass in which they hide themselves. 
This army worm 1 also find, is one and the same insect all over 
our country. I have seen specimens of the moths bred from it 
