l6 SECOND REPORT OF THE STATE ENTOMOLOGIST. 



The insect probably Spheiwphorus sculp tilis. — The locality from which 

 the material was received rendered it highly probable that the species 

 was the sculptured corn-curculio, Sphenophoriis sculptilis Uhler.* 



This pernicious beetle extends over a large portion of the United 

 States, occurring in Georgia, Kansas, Missouri, Illinois, and some of 

 the Eastern States. It is particularly injurious, at times, in New York. It 

 is of a small size, black, about three-tenths of an inch long, subcylin- 

 drical or a long-oval, its wing-covers marked with rows of punctures, 

 its strongly curved beak of the thickness of a stout horse-hair and about 

 one-third the length of the body. In the month of June the beetles 

 may be found just beneath the surface of the ground, with their beak 

 thrust into the young stalks from which they are drawing the sap. 

 Through this method of attack the little holes above mentioned are 

 made, and the growth of the plant arrested. 



The attack and how to prevent it. — It is .probable that the eggs of the 

 beetle are deposited in the holes made in the stalk by its beak. 

 The larva upon hatching from the egg, burrows downward and destroys 

 the tap-root. When full-grown, it changes to the pupa state within the 

 lower portion of the stalk. It is thought that it transforms to the per- 

 fect state — the beetle, during the autumn, hibernating in this stage, 

 and coming abroad the following May or June to deposit its eggs. 

 When the attack of this insect is first noticed, if sand is well moistened 

 with kerosene oil, and a small handful distributed among the young 

 blades of corn in a hill, as the oil is carried into the soil by the rain, it 

 should kill the beetles engaged in their depredations. The same dress- 

 ing applied earlier may be more effectual by preventing, through its 

 odor, the deposit of the eggs. If only a few hills show the attack, the 

 ground might be drawn away by hand from the stalks, and the beetles 

 taken from them and destroyed. 



The Bed-Bug Infesting a Library. 

 It is not very often that this insect occurs under the conditions men- 

 tioned in the following communication — among books and paperg — 

 where it would be so difficult to destroy it: 



Will you tell us something about the bed-bug, what its habits are, 

 when it "spawns," what it eats, how long it lives, and if it ever dies ? 

 I ask because I have moved into a house that I find was already occu- 

 pied by several colonies of the pest. The room in which I have my 

 library has the most. They are in my files of papers and periodicals. 

 They seem to grow fatter every day, but for the life of me, I cannot 

 tell what they live on. The beds and furniture are poisoned with cor- 



* See First Report on the Injurious and other Insects of the State of New York, 1882, 

 pp. 253-263. 



