April. '09] JOURNAL OF ECONOMIC ENTOMOLOGY 149 



insect that is constantly increasing- in numbers and continually widen- 

 ing its zone of injury. 



Thorough, examination of the surrounding region, especial attention 

 being paid to native food plants, disclosed no attack upon these by this 

 insect and I became convinced that the species was an introduced one. 

 Mr. E. A. Schwarz recently' examined specimens I brought to him and 

 determined the species as Phytonomus murimis Fab., a European 

 species not hitherto reported in this country. A single specimen had 

 previously been determined by Mr. Schwarz as P. castor Leconte.^ 

 "While we have not had the opportunity to compare the specimens with 

 Leconte's type, his description so closely fits the European specimens 

 and the Utah species that there seems to be no doubt but that we here 

 have another instance of a species described from a wrongly assigned 

 locality. Doctor Leconte giving "Canada" as the habitat, while the 

 probabilities are strong that his specimen was of European origin.^ 



In Europe this species has long been known as a serious pest to al- 

 falfa^ and its advent into the western continent is of considerable im- 

 portance, the number of insects already attacking the alfalfa being 

 sufficient to make the question more than interesting to both the farmer 

 and the entomologist. 



The earliest definite report of injury in Utah that I have been able 

 to trace is one that occurred in the spring of .1904, on a farm on the 

 east side of Salt Lake City. Several acres of alfalfa in one field were 

 at that time seriously injured, the first crop being one half lost and 

 the second crop practically destroyed. While this was evidently the 

 first serious loss, it should be considered that it must have taken sev- 

 eral years for the insect to multiply in sufficient numbers to cause such 

 an appreciable injury to the crop. 



Distribution 



The zone of injured fields has been constantly increasing, until at 

 the present time it is known to occur from the hills northeast of the 

 city to some distance south of the town of Sandy and eastward to the 

 foothills. The western edge of the infestation until the past two years 

 seemed to be the railroad lines running south from Salt Lake City. It 

 has now passed this barrier and spread for some three miles west- 

 ward along one line and a mile in another place. This makes a total 

 area of almost 100 square miles of territory, in which there is prob- 

 ably grown about 2.500 acres of alfalfa. The extension to the west 



^1876: Leconte; The Rhynchophora of America, North of Mexico (Proc. Am. 

 Philos. Sec. XV, Dec, No. 96, p. 126). 



^882: Riley; Report 1, Entomologist. U. S. D. A., p. 172. 

 ^1848: Heeger; Isis, p. 980. 



