The peach-borer (_Sanninoidea exitiosa_ Say) is probably the commonest and is certainly the most ancient enemy of the peach in America. It is found everywhere east of the Rocky Mountains and, since it is a native, its natural host being the wild species of Prunus, it has been a parasite on the peach from the earliest introduction of this fruit. All in all, it is the most destructive insect-pest of the peach, its presence always endangering the life of the tree. All peach-growers know the peach-borer. It is a white, grub-like caterpillar with a yellowish, shield-like head, which lives and feeds in the trunk of the peach just below the surface of the ground, eating out irregular chambers and galleries underneath the bark, sometimes girdling the trees. The pest is easily discovered through the exudation from the infested part of gum mixed with borings and excreta. The borers are found at all times in the summer, usually very small in late summer and autumn but an inch or more in length in early summer. The borer is a larva of a wasp-like moth which lays its eggs in early summer; these hatch in from seven to ten days and the minute borers work their way into the tree. The moth may be deterred somewhat from depositing her eggs by thorough cultivation, mounding the trees and, according to some, by the use of obnoxious coverings or poisonous washes on the trunk. Preventive measures are seldom sufficiently effective, however, and the borers must be destroyed. This is best done by digging them out with a knife or wire--"worming" in the parlance of the peach-grower. The lesser peach-borer (_Sesia pictipes_ Grote & Robinson) is rather infrequently found infesting the peach in New York. It usually attacks only old trees or those showing injury from freezing or other causes. The borer is much like the common peach-borer, described in the foregoing paragraph, but is smaller, seldom reaching the length of four-fifths of an inch. Unlike the true borer, it infests the trunks as well as the crowns of peach-trees, feeding in much the same way. Fortunately the pest is not common in the State, for it is rather difficult to control, since not only the crown but the trunk must be reached in worming for the pest.