STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



95 



be employed in fighting it; some account of the natural remedies and 

 concluded by referring to such points in its histoiy as were then unsettled, 

 or upon which there were different opinions expressed. It would be 

 needless to repeat any thing that was there said, for any new members, 

 who may not have heard the reading of that essay will find it in the 

 Transactions; so we will confine ourselves to some of the mooted points. 

 I am glad to be able to inform you that I have forever settled the prin- 

 cipal question, namely as to its being single or double-brooded. 



[FlGURB I.] 



(a) larva ; (b) pupa ; (c) beetle — all magnified ; (d) beetle natural size, 

 showing how it punctures fruit. 



You will recollect that authors have, from the beginning, held differ- 

 ent views on this subject, and this fact should not surprise us when we 

 bear in mind that tliey reasoned simply from conjecture; nor will it 

 surprise us when we understand the facts in the case. 



The facts that fresh and soft Curculios are found in this latitude as 

 early as the beginning of July, and that they still come out of the ground 

 in August, or as late as September and even Octobei*, in more northerly 

 latitudes, are well calculated to mislead; while it was difficult to imagine 

 an insect living ten months before ovipositing without its dwindling 

 away through the action of its enemies. But in the beetle state the 

 Curculio has few, if any, enemies, and in my former writings on this 

 subject I have shown that the other facts do not in the least prove the 

 insect to be double-brooded. Among those whose opinions commanded 

 respect, from their profound entomological knowledge and general 

 accuracy, was Mr. Walsh, who, during liis last years strenuously con- 

 tended that this insect was double-brooded. For several years I have 

 entertained a different opinion, believing that it was single-brooded as a 

 rule and only exceptionally double-brooded; and the facts so fully bear 

 me out in this opinion, that, were my late associate here with us, to-day, 

 I should bring forth the testimony with a feeling of triumph, for he was 

 not often in the wrong! It is worthy of remark, however, that Mr. 

 Walsh's first impression, as given by him in the year 1S67,* was that 



♦ Practical Entomologist, vol. I, No. 7. 



