98 BEETLES. 



prevention: — Prevent egg-laying ; clear the ground of 

 Wire worm, and get a good start for the plant ; keep 

 up the strength of the plant under attack, and keep the 

 power of the Wireworm in check; and also do not 

 dress your land with Wireworm, either in 

 decayed turf or by letting grass homes 

 for it be amongst your crops. The 

 subject is one of great importance.* 



TJte sixth section, having for the most 

 part five -jointed feet, includes the Soft- 

 winged Beetles [Malacodernii) , such as 

 Glow-worms, and those commonly 

 known as "Soldiers" and "Sailors"; 

 also the Death-watch Beetles, and 

 many other kinds of wood-boring 

 ■^'VeeS.^"" Beetles. But, excepting a kind in- 

 jurious to Easpberry plants {By turns 

 tomentosus) , I am not aware of their attacks being 

 serious to fruit or crops. 



In some years, as in 1891, these " Easpberry Bee- 

 tles " do great harm in Easpberry plantations. They 

 come out in the spring and attack the buds and 

 blossoms, but this is not all. The maggots which 

 hatch from the eggs laid by the female Beetle beside 

 the young forming fruit, feed within it till it and they 

 reach maturity, and thus cause a second series of 

 losses. When mature they leave the fruit, and turn to 

 pupal state in cocoons under Easpberry bark, or some 

 shelter about the bushes, from which the yellowish 

 downy Beetles come out in spring. The most satis- 

 factory remedy appears to be shaking the infested 

 shoots over bags soaked in paraffin oil. 



Some of the Beetles of this section of Malacoderms 

 feed, in beetle or larval state, on living insects ; some 

 on bones, dry skins or carcases ; some in standing or 



* Full notes by good agriculturists are to be found in the ' Journal 

 of the Koyal Agricultural Society,' part I., for 1883, and iilso in my 

 ' Keport on Wireworm in Observations of Injurious Inseci lor 1882/ 

 iiublished in 1883. 



