Insect Notes for 1908

by Edith M. Patch

Insect Notes for 1908 offers a concise look at pests, damage, and practical remedies observed across Maine.

This field-focused volume summarizes how farmers and researchers tracked beetles, caterpillars, aphids, and other garden and orchard pests. It also records practical notes on management, natural enemies, and seasonal patterns observed in the region.

Hands-on observations of borers in cane and cane injury, with simple, seasonally timed control ideas. Accounts of common pests like the plum curculio and squash bugs, plus notes on their impact on fruit and vegetables. Details on predatory and parasitic insects that helped reduce caterpillar numbers and other pests. Accounts of grasshoppers and other widespread insects, including their effects on crops and notes on disease and ecology. Ideal for readers of agricultural history, pest management basics, and early 20th-century field notes from Maine researchers.

40 pages, Hardcover

Published August 30, 2018

About the author

Edith Marion Patch (27 July 1876 – 28 September 1954) was an American entomologist and writer. Born in Worcester, Massachusetts, she received a degree from the University of Minnesota in 1901 and originally embarked on a career as an English teacher before receiving the opportunity to organize the entomology department at the University of Maine. She became the head of the entomology department in 1904, and, despite misgivings from several male colleagues about having a female department head, she remained in this post until her retirement in 1937.[1] Patch is recognized as the first truly successful professional woman entomologist in the United States.

Patch earned her master's degree from the university of Maine in 1910 and a Ph.D. from Cornell University in Ithaca, New York in 1911. During her career, she was recognized as an expert on aphids and published Food Plant Catalogue of the Aphids in 1938. She was elected president of the American Nature Study Society and in 1930 became the first female president of the Entomological Society of America. Patch's residence in Old Town, Maine, was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 2001 (from Wikipedia article)