WHITE BUTTERFLY

Gisborne Times, Volume LXXIII, Issue 11877, 23 February 1933, Page 3

WHITE BUTTERFLY

MENACE TO CROPS

i I A P. A SITES LT BEE ATE D

PALMERSTON N., Feb. IS

“T hesitate to think what would have happened in the .Hawke's Bay district had the weather been favourable this season for the propagation of the white butterfly. Had there been a dry season most of the crops would have gone,’’ said Mr. .1. Muggeridge, =RVSo. ,-oT t lie -Plant Resenfvß Station. ....

Mr. Muggeridge said there wore mil lions "of the pest on a crop of chon mocllior which he had visited during the week. They wore just like a fluttering white cloud. If the district received a spell of dry autumn weather lie doubted whether there would be ally crops left.

Every butterfly, in its larvae state, had to cat a few square feet of leaf tissue for its subsistence, and this meant a heavy toll over the countryside, said Mr. Muggeridge. The white butterfly ate twelve times as much as the diamond-hacked moth. Dealing with the work of the Plant Research Station in combating the pest. Mr. Muggeridge said 30.000 larval parasites and 4000 pupal parasites had been sent to Maraekakako to launch an offensive on the pest. “T have actually found the laval parasite at work,” lie said. ' It. is distinctly promising; and multiplies at such an extent that it lias overtaken the white butterfly in some countries, gopie definite results will he known during the year, and periodical inspections will be made right into the winter in the districts where the parasites have been liberated.”