Insect-Killing Worms May Help New York

By WILLIAM KATES, Associated Press Writer

Alfalfa beetles cross a highway in this 1992 photo provided by the Cornell Cooperative Extension. After 20 years of research, Cornell University scientists have discovered a pair of microscopic, insect-killing worms that prey on the beetle, an invasive species that has infested 500,000 acres in nine northern New York counties -- nearly 14 percent of the state's cropland -- since it was first identified in 1933. (AP Photo/Cornell Cooperative Extension)

(AP) -- Each spring, tens of millions of alfalfa snout beetles rise from the soil to continue their slow, methodical march across upstate New York, laying waste to fields of alfalfa in a single growing season.

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