14 



THE HESSIAN FLY, 



In most places where the Hessian fly has been under notice 

 two broods occur yearly, and the economy of the species is as 

 follows, it being premised that the second brood is that of which 



we know more from the obvious results of its attacks : The 



autumn flies emerge in August or September from the pupge, which 

 are almost invariably found above the second joint of the straw 

 from below, and seek out the young wheat or barley (it is one of 



Fig. 2. 



these the fly chiefly attacks) ; placing eggs on the sheath or young 

 leaves, the larvae work their way gradually into the plants, which 

 die off about the time the insects turn to pupre, in which state the 

 winter is passed. Emerging about April, the next brood of flies 

 finds the crop in an advanced stage of growth, and the larvae pro- 

 duced in May feed in, or between the sheath and the stem. 

 Here they lie in small parties of six or eight (Fig i), and the stem, 

 when they are increasing in size, bends at an angle and not 

 unfrequently breaks at the point where the attack has been made, 

 the ear, if formed, containing but a few dwarfed grains. By the 

 time the corn is cut, or soon after, the insect has completed its 

 larval existence and is ready to journey elsewhere in its form of 

 " flax-seed " during the autumn, for it does not seem probable that 

 the pupae or " flax-seed " which are produced from the spring 

 wheat scatter to any distance. 



