278 [Docember, 



Insects damaging lead. — For a good many years tlie Natural History 

 Museum has been receiving from various parts of the globe pieces of lead 

 damaged by insects, and as doubt has frequently been expressed as to such 

 a thing being possible, the following information is given either from previously 

 published records or else from our ovrn files. In the " Electrical Review," 

 December 8th, 1911, the Chief Engiueer of the Australian Federation Tele- 

 graphs states how the lead sheathing of the telephone cables in Adelaide had 

 been eaten awaj'^ in places for several inches by Termites, and how seveuil 

 years previously Termites had eaten throuah the bitumen compound coverii g 

 the Sydney Tramway cables and attacked the lead sheathing, finally eatin;j 

 into the insulation of the high-tension cables, thus causing frequent break- 

 downs and enormous expense, as miles of cable were affected. Damajie of 

 H similar nature has been reported from Buenos Ayres and Hongkong. In 

 " Insect Life," iv, 1891, pp. 81 and 202, Riley and Howard relate how a Cossid 

 larva bored its way through a large lead bullet, which had become embedded 

 in an oak-tree in which the larva was living, and how the larvae of Mono- 

 hanwius confiisor Kirby, bored through a lead pipe 2^ inches thick, while they 

 quote another instance from " Gesundheit's Ingenieur," January 15, 1891, of a 

 " wood-wasp " also cutting through a lead pipe. The earliest published record 

 of an insect damaging lead which we have been able to find is that contained 

 in Kirby and Speuce, Entomology, ed. 7, 1856, p. 120, note (3), where these 

 authors state that the larva of Callidium \_IIylotrt(pes\ bajulum L, made its 

 way through sheets of lead one-sixth of an inch in thickness. In May of this 

 year we had specimens of Teifopium gabrieli Weise sent us by Prof. A. Denny, 

 Sheffield University, who stated that these beetles had been guilty of per- 

 forating the lead lining of wooden vats. Mitsuhashi in his work on the 

 Japanese Buprestidae (*' Byochugai Zasshi," vi, no. 4, 1919), on the authority of 

 Piof. Sasaki, has recorded Buprestis japo/iensis Saund. injuring lead-piping. 

 In Bull. 10 (n. s.), U.S. Dept. Agr. Bur. Ent. 1898, p. 88, Howard states how 

 a species of Lyctus bored through the lead lining of a water tank and thereby 

 nearly caused a law suit, while for a good mauy years there has been on 

 exhibit in the Museum a piece of lead riddled by the borings of an Anobimii. 

 In the early part of March of this year we received from Major Gambler- Parry, 

 of llighuani Court, Gloucester, a good many specimens of Ptinus scxpunctuius 

 I'z., together with some pupae of Osmia rtifa L. Our correspondent related 

 how the lead on the roof of the billiard-room had been punctured by some 

 insect, and wherever the holes were in the lead the Ptinus was found. W& 

 %vere unsuccessful in obtaining any of the damaged lead. This case has been 

 dealt with already (see Morley, ante, p. 107), but we see no reason why 

 Morley should credit the damage to Osmia rufa. In the Bull. Ent. Research, 

 vi, 1915, p. 201, it is recorded how Lounsbury found Sino.vylon rujicovne Thr. 

 boring in the lead-covered aerial cables in S. Africa, the hole being bored at a 

 point in the cable sheath immediately underneath the marline suspender by 

 which the cable is attached to the suspending wire. Similar damage has been 

 dune iu Queensland b}"^ Bostrychopsis jesuita F. and Xyloperfha sp., while 

 Frnggalt (Agr. Jouru. N. S. Wales, 28, no. 11, 1917) records Xylothrips gibbi- 

 collis doing almost identical damage, two beetles being actually round in situ. 

 Leslie [Ann. Soc. Eat. France, Ixix, 1900 (1901), p. 591 (note)j quotes another 

 Bostiychid, Scobicia pustulata, as boring in a gas-pipe in Europe. The only 



