70 THE REPORT OF THE No. 19 



ing a two year generation ; that is, covering a portion of two calendar years, but completing 

 their life cycle within twelve months. 



The life history is given as follows, as observed in Silesia. Here, again, the white alder 

 was seemingly preferred. The larva first works flatways under the bark, and then goes 

 straight, ascending into the wood. Fig. 6, Plate. The larva makes the first chamber under 

 the bark the first summer, and af er hibernation begins to excavate its gallery into the sound 

 wood, ascending as a steep passage — sometimes as a broken one — still directly into the sap- 

 wood, and before pupating the larva reverses its position and lies with its head downward in 

 the burrow, fiesides the white alder Alnus incana^ black alder A. glutinosa, and of the wil- 

 lows, Sali.i- purpura, S. viminalis and S. triandra are given as food plants, coupled with the 

 statement that the willows along the railroads were badly injured, and in many places entirely 

 destroyed by the ravages of this insect. 



Judeich and Nitsche, in " Lehrbuch der Mitteleuropaischen Forstinsektenkunde," 

 II. Abtheilung, 1889, deal at length with the insect, but do not clear up the obscurity in its life 

 history, viz., do the beetles emerging in the fall come from eggs laid in the spring of the same 

 year, or from those laid the preceding year ? The eggs are, for the most part, deposited 

 singly in the bark of young alders, both black and white, and willows, including, besides those 

 previously mentioned, Salix cuprea, and the larvse eating out a hollow space under the bark, 

 later force their way upward and deep into the wood. In case of small growths they work only 

 in the centre. Before pupation the larva turns head downwards and prefers to hibernate in 

 the larval chamber, climbing down the chamber when ready to emerge, and eating out a round 

 hole in the bark for exit, near the place where the larval injury began. In proof that the 

 beetles do not hibernate outside, the observations of Taschenberg are cited, who observes that 

 where its dwelling-places about Halle were flooded during the winter, it was never to be found 

 among the floating reeds and underbrush. 



Eckstein, in " Zeitschrift fur Forst-und Jagdwdsen," XXIII,, Bd 1891, p. 378, states that 

 single willows in the forest botanical garden were attacked by this insect and badly injured. 

 He also calls attention to the fact that, in badly infested stems, tie larvre frequently take a 

 descending course instead of an ascending one, and also that the beetle does not gnaw a separa'e 

 exit after leaving the pupal chamber, but follows the larval gallery, and makes its exit through 

 openings made by external agencies. 



Taschenberg, " Brehm's Tierloben, Insekten," 9 Bd., p. 163, 1892, states that on the banks 

 of the Saal, near Halle, the larvae live in the old gnarled root-stocks of the basket willows, 

 causing these to die gradually, earlier than ihey would otherwise have done, and that in alder 

 nurseries the larvte do serious damage, and that they destroy plantations of young birch. 

 Tubeuf, in "Forstlich-Naturwissenschaftliche Zeitschrift," I. Jahrgang, p. 387, adds the Alpine 

 alder, Alnus viridis, to the list of food plants of the suecies, and finds fully developed beetles in 

 the burrows in September, where the weather is cold and it frequently snows during that 

 month. 



History of the Species in America. 



The first published record of the occurrence of the insect in America is by William Juelich, 

 in " Entomologica Americana," Vol. III., p. 123, 1887. Mr. Juelich, early in June of that 

 year, took a section of willow that had been blown down near West Bergen, New Jersey, and 

 from it on July 3rd there emerged two adults, and later he succeeded in getting ten more from 

 pieces of the same willow. He states also that he had, five years before (1882), collected a single 

 specimen on willow near Williamsbiudge, about twelve miles from where he secured his pieces of 

 willow from which he reared the later specimens, and also that Mr. Ottomar Dietz had taken a 

 specimen on Staten Island. From the pieces of willow Mr. Juelich also reared three specimens 

 of an Ichneumon, Ej^hicdtes irritator Feih., and, as no trace of other insects inhabitating the 



