ENTOMOLOUIOAL SOCIETY OF ONTARIO. 75 



fest for the purpose of depositing their epgs. Then followed a remarkable and interest - 

 ing occurrence^ probably never before observed in the life habits of this and other species of 

 Scolytids. They with numerous other members of the Scolytid family, including both bark 

 and timber beetles, must have started, with one accord, in search of more favorable condi- 

 tions for their propagation, for they occurred in different sections of the State, at about 

 the same time, in great swarms like migrating locusts. Specimens were sent to us ac- 

 companied by startling accounts of plagues of bugs that invaded mill yards, furniture 

 shops, newly painted houses, etc. They were reported as coming like a hailstorm against 

 the windows, and in at the open doors like swarms of bees, and that the air on all sides was 

 full of them. During my absence from Morgantown (where our station is located) one of 

 these migrating swarms of Scolytids invaded the town and occurred at certain houses and 

 at furniture factories in such immense numbers that some of the people became alarmed. 

 The report was started that Hopkins' German bugs had devoured all of the pine bugs and 

 were going to prove like the English Sparrow, a universal pest. It was probably well 

 for me that I was absent at the time. 



The men were painting a new greenhouse at the station at the time, and the number 

 of the beetles attracted to the building, evidently by the odor of turpentine, was so great 

 that the men were exceedingly annoyed in their work. When I returned to the station, 

 several days after, I found evidence of their numbers in the handfuls of dead beetles that 

 failed to escape from the greenhouse. 



Dendroctonus terebrant< occurred in by far the greater numbers in these migrating 

 swarms, and when they failed to find dying or injured trees they attasked living Pine of 

 all kinds. Black Spruce and Norway Spruce, entering the bark at the base of the trees. 

 Some of the trees thus attacked in May were examined July 15, and the bark near the 

 point of the attack was found to contain parent adults, eggs, and full-grown larvse, the 

 larvaj occurring in great numbers surrounded by the flowing turpentine. Trees so attacked 

 were still living, but the injury will probably cause a diseased condition of the trees, 

 which will attract other species and result in their final death, thus we may be on the eve 

 of a new destructive invasion like that which has just passed. Other species, like Poly- 

 graphus riifipennis, Tomicus callir/raphus, and Tomicus cacographus, which are capable of 

 existing iu green, sappy Vjark, occurred in such abundance in the dying spruce and pine 

 trees last spring that it is evident they must exist in the forests in great numbers, and are 

 ready to attack trees showing the slightest indication of disease or weakened vitality, if 

 they do not make a primary attack. 



Therefore, this imported enemy will find abundant food and favorable conditions for 

 its rapid increase in the infested bark of felled trees, tops and stumps in lumbering re- 

 gions in which or near which the colonies have been placed. 



This imported Clerid does not confine itself to one or two species of Ijark beetles in 

 one kind of trees, but the adults, it would seem, will attack and devour the adults of any 

 species of bark and timber beetles found in the United States, and their larva will feed 

 on the eggs, larv;i3, pupie and young beetles of any species infesting the bark of pine and 

 spruce trees. In fact, they are inclined to make themselves generally obnoxious to the 

 little bark pests. 



It would seem that all of the conditions necessary for the imported Clerid to 

 multiply and become an efficient protector of our |)ine forests from future destructive in- 

 vasions of bark beetles are most favorable. Dendroctonus frontalis, ev'ideniXy the most 

 destructive enemy of our pine forests, has, from some cause, been reduced far beyond 

 its destructive powers. Other species which have depended upon it for the primary at- 

 tack are, it would appear, somewhat demoralized on account of the disappearance of their 

 benefactor. The large amount of felled timber found in the several lumbering regions 

 will probably attract the larger portion of other threatening bark beetles away from the 

 green trees, and by the time Denaroctonus frontalis can again marshal sufficient forces 

 to successfully attack and kill the trees, they will, it is hoped, be met with a force of 

 enemies led by the European Bark beetle Destroyer, which will successfully repel them 

 and thus save our forests in the future from destructive invasions of bark beetles. 



