. Bulletin of the Department of Agriculture. Agriculture. NEW MEXICO RANGE CATERPILLAR AND ITS CONTROL. 5 111 cultivated crops the caterpillars devour the leav(>s and, in rare instances, the upper and tender portions of the stem. The caterpillars are very greedy and wasteful feeders, often eating only a small part of each plant destroyed. Frequently they will bite tlii'ough a plant stem several niches below its top and then eat from this point down to the junction of stem and roots, leaving the upper part of the plant as waste. They are equipped with large, powerful jaws and eat a trem
. Bulletin of the Department of Agriculture. Agriculture. NEW MEXICO RANGE CATERPILLAR AND ITS CONTROL. 5 111 cultivated crops the caterpillars devour the leav(>s and, in rare instances, the upper and tender portions of the stem. The caterpillars are very greedy and wasteful feeders, often eating only a small part of each plant destroyed. Frequently they will bite tlii'ough a plant stem several niches below its top and then eat from this point down to the junction of stem and roots, leaving the upper part of the plant as waste. They are equipped with large, powerful jaws and eat a tremendous amount of plant matter each. Fig. 4.—Diagram illustrating liie cycle of the New Mexico range caterj^illar. (Original.) day. Much of tliis food is not fully digested, but passes through the caterpillar and is voided in an apparently slightly changed condition. Oftentimes it appears that the caterpillars eat from habit rather than necessitv. INJURY CAUSED BY POISONING UNEATEN PLANTS. When partly grown the range caterpillai-s develop poisonous spines, probably as a protection against birds or insect-eatmg mammals. In crawling from place to place, or duruig the process of moltmg, these spines (see fig. 1) become scattered tln-ough the uneaten Please note that these images are extracted from scanned page images that may have been digitally enhanced for readability - coloration and appearance of these illustrations may not perfectly resemble the original United States. Dept. of Agriculture. [Washington, D. C. ?] : The Department : Supt. of Docs. , Govt. Print. Off.
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1900, bookdecade1910, booksubjectagriculture, bookyear
