Insect identification > Homoptera > Scale insects > Scurfy scale

Scurfy scale

The scurfy scale (Chionaspis furfura Fitch). - This insect, a native of North America, is present nearly everywhere except on the Pacific Coast and perhaps in the most southerly portions of the country but is usually less abundant in the most northern states.

It attacks the apple, pear, mountain ash, currant, gooseberry, hawthorn, Japanese quince and other plants. The full-grown female scale is shorter and broader than the oyster-shell scale and, when perfect in outline, rather pearmale crawling young go to the leaves to settle and the are smaller and somewhat different in shape from those Beneath them they attain their growth, then pupate, scales, and at the end of this process emerge as very adults without any mouths or mouth-parts, having shaped and dirty white in color.

Its life and habits are much the same as those of the oyster-shell scale, but the eggs are fewer in number and dark purple in color, as are also the crawling young which usually hatch a few days later in the season than the other species.