2 
APPLE. 
are not so well known as is desirable, and also the attack itself 
appears to be at times confused with other infestations, some short 
account of it may be useful. 
The Woolly Apple Aphides are of the shape figured, with six legs, 
and (when in winged condition) with two pairs of transparent wings ; 
a head furnished with antennas or horns, and for the most part with a 
rostrum or sucking-tube, by means of which these insects cause great 
mischief. This rostrum is of enormous proportionate length in the 
Aphides when first born, but it is stated to be absent in the egg-laying 
female. The honey-tubes or cornicles are absent or rudimentary. 
The colour differs with condition or sex, but the Aphides may be 
generally described as of some shade of brown in their older stages, 
and of warm brown or red or pinkish in their earlier condition. The 
winged egg-producing female is stated to be yellow, tinged with red. 
The pupae are “ slightly clothed with down. The insects, when adult, 
exude from their pores long silky threads, which curve round a centre, 
and often form long spiral filaments, under which they hide.”— 
Gr. B. B. This wool sometimes shows merely as a film, like a little 
white mould in the crannies haunted by the plant lice ; sometimes it 
shows as tufts and patches on the trunk or boughs, or on leaves, or on 
shoots,—anywhere, in fact, where the insects can establish themselves, 
—and in neglected gardens and orchards may be seen swinging in 
long partly detached masses. The existence of the attack may easily 
be known by the presence of these films or masses of white woolly 
matter, in which the insects shelter themselves, and the young may 
be found collected together thus even in severe cold. I have found 
them sheltered in the cottony material myself during the winter, and 
Mr. Buckton records finding the wingless larvae alive and plentiful on 
Apple branches in December, when snow was on the ground, and the 
thermometer stood at 21° Fahr. 
The mischief is begun by the Aphides inserting their suckers into 
the soft tissues of the trees, and drawing away the sap. They 
especially resort to where boughs or twigs have been removed, and the 
young bark is pressing forward over the wound, or where the outside 
bark may have been detached so that the Aphides can gain access to 
the soft surface beneath ; and the result of the suction and many 
punctures is a soft pulpy swollen growth of the woody layers just 
beneath the bark. As time goes on these growths dry up and die, and 
crack open, and new colonies of Woolly Aphides, establishing them¬ 
selves in the cracks, start new attack, and further diseased growth ; 
and so the unhealthy mass continues increasing in size, until a tree 
which has been suffering from American Blight for several years is 
easily distinguishable by the knobbed and cankery growths. The 
attack of the Woolly Aphis is also sometimes to be found on the roots 
as well as on the branches of Apple trees. 
