THE APPLE BEETLE. 83 



CHAPTER XIII. 



THE APPLE BEETLE. 



( Doticus pestilens. ) 



Order: Coleoptera. Family: Antlorihid'cB. 



About tlie middle of November, 1889,1 received from 

 Mr. Stiggants, orchardist, of Warraiidyte, Victoria, 

 specimens of a little known but very destructive beetle, 

 together with a quantity of shrivelled apj^les. The insect 

 being quite new to me, I sent it to Mr. Oliff, in Sydney, 

 with the request that he would examine and compare it 

 with beetles in the very rich Sydney collections, and, if 

 new, descril3e it. Upon examination, Mr. Olift' found that 

 this particular Apple Beetle was new to science, and he 

 has, from the information furnished by myself as to its 

 depredations, given it the very appropriate specific name 

 of pestilens. This new destroyer of apples is a small 

 brownish beetle measuring about two lines in length (see 

 Plate VIIL, Figs. 4, 5, 5a), covered with reddish-grey 

 down. The antennce (horns) being slightly clubbed, 

 elytra (wing cases) having upon them a row of small 

 tubercles. Legs very long for so small a beetle. 

 Perfect insect, very active, propelling itself, when not on 

 the wing, with a short jerky motion. The grubs are small, 

 and of a yellowish-white colour, as shown in Plate VIIL, 

 Fig. 2; and it is supposed that the egg or eggs are 

 deposited by the female insect in the fruit, shortly after its 

 being formed on the tree. 



Mr. Stiggants informs me that the perforated fruit, as 

 shown in Plate VIIL, Fig. 1, will remain upon the tree 

 the whole year, and, in the centre of these shrivelled fruits, 

 the grub lives and undergoes its various changes 

 (metamorphoses), and finally, at the commencement of the 

 fruit season, is ready to deposit its eggs in the early crop 

 of apples. 



F 2 



