The aegis & intelligencer. [volume] (Bel Air, Md.) 1864-1923, 1877-07-27
THE sEGZS.
BEL AIR, FRIDAY, JULY ~, 1877.
For the A'gis and Intelligencer
A Plan to Wipe Out the Tomato Worm.

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A Plan to Wipe Out the Tomato Worm.
As is well known, the tomato raising area OF
this county has become quite extensive and is
rapidly increasing every year. The big green
worm, however-the formidable enemy of the
tomato plants also increasing quite rs rapid
ly, if not more so, and i'll few years, if not
checked, will probably be so numerous rs to eat
up not only all the profits but all the capital in
vested.
send you a plan which | think will keep
within bounds, if not utterly exterminate this
great, green, disgusting glulton from the face
of the earth For the last few years almost
every one must have noticed attached TO the
loathsome bodies of many of these worms, clus-
tiers of small snow-white objects, shaped some
thing like grains of rice and of about half the
size. These objects vary in number from half a
dozen to fifty or more on each worm. Now,
these are the big worms arch enemies and the
tomato lovers friends. You will notice that
every worm that has them clinging TO it has
decidedly sickly look, is very languid in its
movements, and quite used up-looks, in fact,
as though in the last stage of consumption. If
you will take this pitiful-looking victim and It's
parasites, together with the leaf to which they
are attached, and put them into a loosely cork
ed, transparent vial, you will, in period vary
ing from a few hours to perhaps as many days,
small fly emerge from each of the white
cocoons. Each female of this little swarm, al.
ter due preparation for maternity, alights upon
the tomato worm and inserts her numerous eggs
under his thick skin---for he is q sort of insect
rhinoceros. These eggs are soon Matched out in
the interior of the worm and the larvae at once
commence the work of destruction Like the
Louisiana earpet-baggers, they literally "go
through him. They do not touch his OitalS,
but confine themselves to his fat, which they
take clean ont Of him, leaving him long, lean,
lank, cadaverous object, like the myself" in
the firm of "Mr. Thomas and Myself" as drawn
by the pen of j. A. j. Creswell. They are in
terested in letting him live few days longer,
during which they make their retreat TO his eX
terror by piercing his hide, on the outside of
which they 90 to work and weave themselves
each cocoon or shell already described, and
from this in turn is Matched the fly which has
by this time swung entirely round the circle of
its little life.
Now, the plan is to kill (at least the first year,
all the big worms that you can find that have
none of these cocoons on them, and scrupulous-
ly spare all that haze any on, and your duty for
the year is done. I'll warrant the latter will do
your plants no further harm. Ofcoursc great
many will escape the first year. bnt believe
the second year will see them greatly diminish.
ed in number, and that by the third year they
will be almost destroyed. | tried it last year,
and thus far in the present season although |
have found good many of the worms in ques-
ton with their deadly enemies clingmg to them,
| have as yet seen but very few that were free
from them, and these in positions much shelter
ed from the fly.
When the large green worm has attained its
growth it falls to the ground, in which it bur
rows to considerable depth, and changes to a
chrysalis almost as large as the worm Itself
This chrysalis or pupa is of dark brown hue
and has long slender proboscis, which is folded
down in front, its end being concealed and pro-
tected by the armor which covers the thorax-
When the same ground is turned up the follow.
ing spring many of these mummy-like pup@
will be brought to light and should be destroy
ed, as they would soon become moths and pro-
duce thousands of eggs. / believe these are the
huge moths, which about dusk are seen hover
ing around trumpet-shaped flowers, such as
those of the honeysuckle, the jamestown weed,
sc. This species of moth is nearly as large as
a hummlng-bird, and in the dim shades of twi
light is often mistaken for it, 1t has n sucking
tube nearly two inches long, with which it ex
tracts sweets from flowers whose depths no
other insects can reach. When quiescent this
tube is coied up like awatch.sprng. l think
il is what is sometimes called the deaths head
moth,' from the likeness of q human skull
upon its back. 1t deposits its eggs upon the
leaf of the tomato plant, where they hatch into
the large green worm. q. W. A.
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