230 OAii. 



sometimes entirely stripping the foliage. The eggs are white 

 or pale yellow, and are laid (early in the summer) about six or 

 eight inches below the surface of the ground, the female bur- 

 rowing down to deposit them, and laying thirty or more, near 

 together amongst the disturbed earth. 



The grubs are thick and fleshy, white or yellowish in 

 colour, with strong jaws, and three pairs of legs ; and usually 

 lie on one side, somewhat curved together (as figured, p. 229). 

 At the commencement of spring they come up to within a few 

 inches of the surface of the ground, where they feed on roots 

 of growing plants ; and at the end of the third summer, 

 when full fed, they again go down into the earth to a depth of 

 two feet or more, and change to pupae (as figured, p. 229) in 

 oval cells. 



During the following winter they develop into the perfect 

 Chafers, but do not come up through the ground until the 

 next summer, that is, the fourth year since they were hatched, 

 when they may be found as early as May hanging half-torpid 

 or sluggish beneath the leaves during the day, and coming 

 out on the wing during the evening, when they fly in search 

 of their mates or feed on the foliage of the trees. 



The beetle is too well known to require description, but it 

 may be observed it is about an inch in length, densely covered 

 with down on the breast, and more or less throughout ; part 

 of the front of the face and the wing-cases are rusty or brown, 

 the latter having five raised lines running along each ; the 

 abdomen is prolonged into a tip curved downwards, and 

 marked at the sides with alternate triangular patches of black 

 and snow-white; and the horns are terminated by fans or 

 clubs of seven leaves in the male, six leaves in the female. 



Prevention and Eemedies. — When the May Bugs or 

 Cockchafers appear in the large quantities sometimes re- 

 corded, as when eighty bushels are stated to have been col- 

 lected on one farm (* Encyc. of Agriculture,' 2nd ed., p. 1166), 

 it is worth while to beat or shake them from the trees, 

 preferring noon-time or early on a bright warm day, when the 

 beetles are clinging beneath the leaves and are dull and 

 sluggish. 



They may be shaken down on to large cloths spread 

 beneath the tree, or may be swept together and destroyed, 

 taking care in either case that the Chafers are collected before 

 they have time to recover from the fall and take wing. Pigs 

 will eat them greedily, and so will poultry ; and, if there are 

 more than can thus be got rid of, the services of some boys to 

 trample on or otherwise destroy the shaken-down beetles 

 would p^pbably do all that was needed. 



