March, 1904.] ChITTENDEN : NOTES ON LaNGURIA. 29 



In one plant, eight feet in height, a beetle was found in the stem 

 an inch below the surface of the earth, and the burrows extended to 

 the top of the stem, which was withered and somewhat blackened. 

 The burrows measure from three to six inches in length, and the cast- 

 ings which fill the hollowed stems between them occupy a similar 

 space, and often a considerable space intervenes that is unoccupied. 

 It was quite noticeable that the stems where broadest usually contained 

 adults or pupge that were larger than those occupying narrower por- 

 tions of the stems at the tops, and that the individuals near the base 

 develop earlier, beetles being found there while larvae were at the top. 



A pupa was being devoured by a mite related to Pediculoides 

 ventricosus Newm. 



Languria trifasciata Say. 



This beautiful species develops in the stems of wild lettuce {Lac- 

 tuca canadensis'). Oviposition has been observed at intervals from 

 the middle of June to the first of July. About Washington the insect 

 can be found at any time in August in its three stages within the stems. 

 August 4, exit holes were observed in empty stems, indicating that 

 adults begin to issue from them toward the latter days of July. The 

 proportion of the different stages in the stems from August 4 to 19 

 was : one larva and one pupa to three adults. In most stems the in- 

 teriors had turned brown and the larvae that had occupied them had 

 apparently worked throughout their full length, as there was more or 

 less frass and other evidences of their presence from the roots up to 

 the narrowest part of the stem which the larva was capable of pene- 

 trating. In some stems the larva forms a covering of castings two or 

 three inches from the base ; in others the pupa case is formed as many 

 as two feet from the roots, the location of the castings being reversed, 

 /. e., at the bottom. The beetle in exit cuts through at any point from 

 the roots to near the tops of the stems. 



Nearly every plant of Lactiica that could be examined had been 

 infested by this insect ; yet it had not always visibly affected their 

 development. Those that were entirely free from attack were still 

 green while the lower leaves had begun to wither. Some infested 

 plants were nine or ten feet in height. and were still healthy in ap- 

 pearance. In only one case was there evidence that more than a sin- 

 gle larva inhabited a stem, from which it may be surmised that in case 

 two or more eggs are deposited in the same stem, which undoubtedly 



