:248 



MISSOURI AGRICULTURAL REPORT. 



found in wheat fields. The larva is represented in figure 6, magnified 

 four diameters. The larva is two-thirds of an inch, or a little over, in 

 length when full grown. 



The methods for fighting these insects are the same as we use for 

 all wireworms, and the reader is therefore referred to the discussion of 

 the wheat wireworm, which is the next most destructive wfreworm 

 infesting our corn. 



THE WHEAT WIREWORM. 

 Agriotes mancus, Say. 



The larva of the wheat wireworm beetle is also one of our most 

 common and injurious wireworms found in the corn field. The adult 

 is a small, dark, brown, oval shaped beetle, nearly one-third of an inch 

 in length, with the body densely covered with minute hairs, which, how- 

 ever, would not attract the attention of the ordinary observer unless he 

 were to look at the creature under a hand lens. The beetles are hard 

 and quite slippery when held in the fingers, and are very apt to wriggle 

 away from one when thus carelessly handled. A good idea of the general 

 appearance of these beetles can be had by observing figure 9, which 

 represents one magnified seven diameters. These beetles appear along 



in the spring of the year, usually during 

 April, at which time they may be found 

 hiding under clumps of grass and clover 

 growing in meadows and pastures, and 

 along the fences and byways, also under 

 logs, stones and other secluded places in 

 the fields and along outskirts of forests. 

 These adults fly readily, and also scram- 

 ble over the ground with considerable 

 rapidity. 



They lay their eggs in cultivated and 



uncultivated grassy meadows and other 



places. When these eggs hatch the 



little larvae burrow in the ground and 



Fi? 9.— Adult of the Wheat Wire- feed there upon the roots of various 



worm, Agriotes mancus, enlar^od , < 



seven diameters. grasses and clover. 



These larvae grow very slowly indeed, at least in comparison with 

 the larvae of some insects, still not as slowly as do some well known 

 insects, as, for instance, the seventeen-year locusts. The larvae remain 

 burrowing through the soil and feeding thus upon the roots of the grass 

 and clover until the approach of cold weather, when they hibernate 



