TJic Country Gentleman s Magazine 



109 



^ke Jfann. 



THE TURNIP BEETLE AND CROPS. 



THE report from the eastern parts of 

 Yorkshire as to the growth of wheat 

 is not quite so satisfactory as could have been 

 wished. A correspondent, writing from the 

 Malton district says, that wheat will in all 

 probability prove below an average, though 

 there are a few exceptionably fine crops. Oats 

 and barley look well. Turnips, although only 

 just making an appearance above ground, 

 " have been much injured by the turnip 

 beetle — the turnip fly, improperly so-called." 

 Our correspondent has the authority of Mr 

 Stephens, the author of the " Book of the 

 Farm," for the statement that it is not the fly 

 that first injures the turnip — it is the flea- 

 beetle, Ualtica iieiiiorit/ji. The Rev. J. 

 Duncan described this insect as scarcely 

 /3th inch in length. It is, he said, " smooth, 

 shinmg, and of a brassy black colour, with a 

 slight tinge of green, particularly on the wing 

 cases ; the antennae black, with the second 

 and third joints, and the apex of the first with 

 a pale colour." 



As this little insect is doing a considerable 

 amount of damage in other places than York- 

 shire this season, it will not be inopportune 

 to give a little more of what Mr Duncan — 

 than whom there was no better entomologist 

 so far as insects injurious to farm crops are 

 concerned — wrote about this beetle. He 

 says : — " The thorax is convex above, and 

 pretty deeply punctured ; the wing cases are 

 thickly and irregularly punctured, each of 

 them with a pale yellow or slightly sulphur 

 coloured stripe running along the middle, 

 curved inwards posteriorly, and not reaching 

 quite to the extremity ; the under side of the 

 body and thighs, black." 



Mr Duncan then goes on to tell us that this 

 beetle has such an admiration for the tur- 

 nip plant, that in its larva, as well as in its 



perfect state, it takes a gourmandizing interest 

 in it. Halfica ncinonim is, however, only 

 fond ot tender and young things. When the 

 plants have acquired some degree of strength, 

 and the foliage is considerably developed, the 

 injury done by it is insignificant ; but, unfor- 

 tunately its favourite food is the young plant 

 just as it is beginning to unfold its cotyle- 

 don leaves." These, all farmers know to their 

 cost, are very soon devoured. A London 

 Alderman has no consumptive powers equal 

 to these little insects. Again, quoting from 

 ]Mr Duncan, he says : — "An individual who 

 confined a few, for the purpose of observing 

 their habits, found that they consumed ten 

 young turnip plants in a day. . . They are 

 found to attack the turnip plants as soon as 

 the latter make their appearance ; and one of 

 the difficult points to determine is how they 

 are produced so speedily and so opportunely 

 [inopportunely ?]. 



Mr Duncan quotes H. Le Keux as to the 

 habits of the insect. " The sexes pair from 

 April to September, during which period the 

 eggs are deposited on the under side of the 

 rough leaves of the turnip. The female in- 

 sect apparently does not lay above one egg 

 daily ; in a week, ten pair were found to lay 

 only forty-three eggs." 



The larva of the flea beetle looks by no 

 means a dangerous creature. When the 

 maggot comes into existence from the egg, at 

 the end often days it is about ^sth of an inch 

 in length ; but small as it is, it at once sets to 

 work under the cuticle of the young turnip- 

 leaf, and burrows among the pulp. Nice 

 little galleries they make in the leaves ; pretty 

 for a naturalist to look at, but anything but 

 pleasant for farmers, who have their oxen \x\ 

 the stalls or their sheep in the fold, to con- 

 template. 



