A great number of chewing insects, as distinguished from sucking
insects, defoliate the pear when given an opportunity, but are kept in
check by the treatment for codling moth. The much-dreaded browntail
moth and gypsy moth now have a foothold in the State, but as yet
can hardly be called pests although their advent threatens the pear
industry as it does all other orchard industries. The bud-moth, seldom
seen in well-cared-for orchards, is sometimes a vexatious visitor in
pear-orchards. Three species of caterpillars, all most striking in
appearance, the larval stages of tussock moths, infest pear-trees.
These are the white-marked tussock moth, the rusty tussock moth, and
the definite-marked tussock moth.
The pear-tree has its share of borers. A small, dark brown beetle,
about one-third of an inch in length, the apple twig-borer, sometimes
does considerable damage to young shoots of the pear. The flat-headed
apple-tree borer works in the sap wood of the pear as in the apple.
The shot-hole borer, a tiny insect, eats a small round hole in the
trunk of the pear, as it does also in several fruits, but does little
damage except in devitalized trees. The shot-borer, a tiny black
beetle, one-tenth of an inch long, bores into twigs or small branches
and sooner or later causes their death. None of these borers are
very harmful on the pear in New York, but all must be reckoned with
occasionally. All are difficult to control.
The pear thrips attack the newly opening flower- and leaf-buds and
when the insect, a small winged creature with sucking mouth-parts, is
abundant much damage is done. This pest in New York is chiefly confined
to the Hudson River Valley. The European grain aphis, closely related
to the destructive apple aphis, is sometimes a serious pest on pears.
Both of these pests are comparatively easily controlled by timely
applications of contact insecticides.
Lastly, there are several chewing insects which feed on the leaves of
the pear, which, unless checked, sometimes become major pests for a
season or two in an orchard here and there. All of them, fortunately,
are controlled by the arsenical poisons which are necessary to keep
the codling moth down. The pests are: Cigar case-bearer, green fruit
worm, pistol case-bearer, and oblique-banded leaf-roller. With these,
as with most of the other pests of the pear, cultivation to keep down
all foreign vegetation, and orchard sanitation, consisting chiefly of
the destruction of infested fruit, foliage, or wood, are essential
preventives.
CHAPTER IV
LEADING VARIETIES OF PEARS
ANDRÉ DESPORTES
=1.= Leroy _Dict. Pom._ =1=:127, fig. 1867. =2.= Mas _Pom. Gen._
=3=:51, fig. 122. 1878. =3.= _Cat. Cong. Pom. France_ 138, fig. 1906.
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