ASSASSIN BUGS 



(Family ReduviidcB.) 



This is a large and important family of bugs comprising 

 more tiian two thousand species of which more than one hundred 



and fifty inhabit the United States. Its 

 forms vary much in structure and have 

 been divided among thirteen subfamilies 

 and three hundred and thirty-six gen- 

 era. All are predatory in their habits 

 and feed on other insects which they 

 pierce and whose blood they suck by 

 means of their strong, sharp beaks. 

 From this food some of the subfamilies 

 are known as -'cannibal bugs" or 

 "pirate bugs." Comstock calls them 

 the "assassin bugs." With many 

 species the beak is so strong as to 

 readily pierce the skins of human beings, 

 and one species, known as the " blood- 

 sucking cone-nose" (Conorhiniis san- 

 giiisiiga) so often frequents houses, es- 

 pecially in the southwest, and is so fierce 

 a biter that it is often referred to as " the 

 gigantic bed-bug." It seems, according 

 to Schwarz, to normally inhabit the nests 

 of field mice. Other species, especially 

 Melanolestes picipes and Reduvius per- 

 sonatus, were especially abundant in the 

 eastern states in the summer of 1898, 

 and their bites were responsible for the 

 extraordinary so-called "kissing bug" 

 scare which was greatly advertised by Fig. 181.— Reduvius person- 



. , ^- atus. f Author's illustration.) 



the newspapers. A western species, *"' ^ ' 

 Rasahus binotatus is also a severe biter. Of these "kissing 



393 



Fig 180.- 

 suga. 



-Conorhinus sangui- 

 f Redrawn fro??t 

 Mar la tt. J 



