ea, and then usually starts upward until he gets
level with the surface of the ground, staying there until the next
season. He comes up early in the spring. My practice is to hoe around
the tree before the time for the round-headed borer to deposit eggs. I
keep the weeds clear, so that I can see where the borer went in. If he
has been in a year or two he is near the middle, and you had better let
him alone, as it will injure the tree to remove him. It is impossible to
get rid of these borers by a wash, because the eggs are covered. There
is no connection between the round-headed and flat-headed borers.

T. A. Stanley: It requires three years for the borer to mature and come
out. In my experience, the borer selects a spot where loose bark is on
the tree, and goes in where it is tender. It lays eggs in even rows.
These eggs stay under the bark but a short time when they hatch and the
little worm eats into the tender bark, and goes through it, to live and
grow there; when large enough they go into the body of the tree. They
stay there for three years. Scrape off the bark and put whitewash on the
eggs and it will destroy them.

President Wellhouse: By taking a knife, cutting into the tree, and
running a hooked wire in, you can pull them out. Each female beetle
deposits fifty or sixty eggs, and we find it better and less expensive
to hunt the borers early in the spring. By carefully examining the
bottom of the tree for six or eight inches above the ground you will see
a little brown spot. He came to the bark the fall previous, and sets
about two inches back in his cavity. If you wait till May, he is out and
gone; he is easier taken out in spring than later. By killing the insect
you prevent the egg laying. We always have our men hunt for the insects
that are about to come out. It is easy to find the little brown spot
about the size of your finger end, and you can kill them by pouring a
few drops of coal-oil from a machine can into the cavity.

Dr. J. Stayman: Can we prevent the borer from entering the tree? I have
practiced banking up my trees as steep as I can, about a foot high; less
may do. The beetle will not deposit eggs where the tree is banked up. I
have practiced this for thirty years, and have never seen a borer in my
trees since I began it. Like these gentlemen, I at first cut out the
borers. We can prevent them by banking up early in the spring. By
instinct, it knows the bank will wash down. If it deposits its eg