342 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



pale-gray. These hairs become broad, flattened scales on the 

 sides of the body. The prothorax is triangular, seen from above, 

 swollen on the sides, and the head, exclusive of the snout, is 

 very small. The body behind is unusually broad ; the wing- 

 covers have each nine (Curtis mentions only eight) longitudi- 

 nal, fine, punctate furrows, the ridges between being much flat- 

 tened. The legs are rather short, and pale-gray like the rest 

 of the body. Curtis mentions that the hindermost thighs have 

 a short, thick tooth beneath. I find one on the thighs of both 

 the middle and hind legs. However, the insect may be con- 

 sidered as identical with the European species, until proved 

 otherwise by comparison of specimens, as it has probably been 

 imported in radish and turnip seed. In Europe this weevil was 

 first observed among turnip seed, where as a white maggot it 

 devours the seed in the pods. When fully fed it gnaws a hole 

 through the side of the pod, out of which it escapes, and makes 

 its way into the ground two or three inches below the surface, 

 where it forms a brown, oval cocoon of the grains of dirt. Here 

 it remains three weeks in the pupa state, and by the third week 

 in July the beetle appears. Mr. Curtis, whose account we have 

 reproduced, thinks that the female lays its eggs in the embryo 

 pods. 



The Pitchy-Legged Weevil. — Another weevil has for several 

 years been not uncommon in Essex County, which in England, 

 from which it has been imported, is often, as Mr. Curtis says, 

 "a dreadful pest in gardens, committing sad ravages on vines 

 in hot-houses and on wall fruit, during the night, when they 

 emerge from their hiding-places in old walls, from under the 

 bark, and clods of earth, to revel upon the branches of the new 

 wood in April, or to feed upon the young shoots, which soon 

 become black. They likewise injure raspberry plants in spring, 

 by eating through the flowering stems and leaves, and they nib- 

 ble off the bark, and eat out the buds of apple and pear trees 

 as early as February or March." But they are said by Curtis 

 to do still more damage to pease, turnips, and young winter- 

 plants, as savoy, kale, broccoli, &c. 



I have detected this weevil on the Beach Pea during the last 

 week in July, and it is not uncommon in gardens, and even, if I 



