The Life of the Weevil 



points of what the Pea-weevil showed us. 

 Each grub digs itself a cell in the floury mass, 

 while respecting the skin in the form of a pro- 

 tective disk, which the adult will easily be 

 able to push out at the moment of leaving. 

 Towards the end of the larval phase, the 

 cells show through on the surface of the bean 

 as so many dark circles. At last the lid falls 

 off, the insect leaves its cell and the haricot 

 remains pierced with as many holes as it had 

 grubs feeding on it. 



Very frugal, satisfied with a few floury 

 scraps, the adults seem not at all anxious to 

 abandon the heap so long as beans worth ex- 

 ploiting remain. They mate in the inter- 

 stices of the stack; the mothers scatter their 

 eggs at random; the young grubs make them- 

 selves at home, some in the untouched hari- 

 cots, some in the beans that are holed but 

 not yet exhausted; and the swarming is re- 

 peated every five weeks throughout the sum- 

 mer, after which the last generation, the one 

 born in September or October, slumbers in 

 its cells till the return of the warm weather. 



If ever the spoiler of the haricots became 

 too ominously threatening, it would not be 

 very difficult to wage a war of extermination 

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