238 JOURNAL OF ECONOMIC ENTOMOLOGY [Vol. 4 



and lining it inside with a silky water-tight substance exuded from 

 the mouth. In this retreat it passes the winter — turns to a pupa late 

 the following May and appears as a perfect fly in June. 



The chief injury is due to the breaking down of wheat stems during 

 winds and to their being cut through when the insect enters the 

 ground. 



The principle remedy lies in banishing the insect from cultivated 

 ground as it will then only appear when its native food plants fail to 

 produce heads. 



Experiments with a view to discovering what depth of covering 

 the fly could make its way through, proved that four inches of earth, 

 when packed, was sufficient to prevent this, but that six inches were 

 required when the earth remained loose. In working their way out 

 at this depth, the flies are unable to keep a perpendicular direction 

 and gradually turn over backwards making, if they live long enough, 

 a complete circle. They seldom survived, however, a sufficient time 

 to accomplish this, dying within fifteen hours. 



Taking into consideration its life history the following remedies 

 were tried and proved effective : 



(1) Plough all infested stubble land before June 15, not less than 

 four inches deep, to be afterwards packed, or six inches deep without 

 packing. 



(2) Cut all infested grass, between July 10 and August 1. This 

 will catch the larvae in the stems before they reach the ground. Burning 

 infested stubbles or grasses in order to destroy larvse while hibernating 

 is absolutely valueless as all larvae remain well out of reach below 

 the ground. 



The injury to growing grain during 1910 was not as extensive as it 

 was the previous year, though in some places on odd fields it probably 

 exceeded 2 per cent. 



Wire Worms, Corymbites ceripennis Kby. — Slightly injurious to 

 grain crops in spring and later to potatoes. 



Grasshoppers or Locusts. — These insects became very abundant 

 during the season and did some injury to cereal crops in spite of the 

 repressive measures adopted. Fortunately a backward spring delayed 

 their appearance, so that all vegetation became well advanced before 

 they commenced to attack it. The chief damage was done after locusts 

 commenced to fly, as it then became a costly and difficult matter to 

 spread poison bait over such an extended area, especially as the remun- 

 eration — due to bad crops — was not great. The "Criddle Mixture" 

 again proved far superior to anything else, after locusts had once 

 hatched, and in the Aweme district where it had to be applied frequently, 

 it caused great destruction among the insects a-nd unquestionably saved 



