68 Forty-first Report on the State Museum. 



killed by the use of pyretbrum, but without seeming to diminish their 

 number in the least. They collected at times upon the windows so 

 numei'ously as to soil the panes greatly. 



Their Spring Awakening. 



Their principal annoyance to the family seems to have been in the 

 spring when they were awakening from their hibernation. Many that 

 had doubtless been excluded from the house by the screens that cov- 

 ered the windows, had found acceptable retreats in crevices between 

 the brick wall of the building and a substantial wooden covered porch 

 erected over the front door. On April fourth of the present year, 

 large numbers of the fly were observed at each side of the porch, 

 moving sluggishly over the ice and snow which lay there at a depth 

 of two feet. So abundant were they that kerosene was poured over 

 them where they were the thickest, and very many were thus killed. 

 At the same time they could be seen climbing up the front wall of the 

 house, even to the roof. 



Eflforts for their Destruction. 



On April twelfth, upon the discovery that multitudes were emerging 

 from the crevices between the porch and wall, insect powder was 

 blown in upon them with a powder-bellows, and in an hour's time, as 

 rejjorted, " millions were scattered over the stone steps. They were 

 taken up three or four times that day, and again on the eighteenth, 

 twentieth and twenty-second, and dropped quickly into boiling water, 

 for if left awhile they revived. Since that time they gradually dis- 

 ajjpeared," and on May third, the date of a letter received, none were 

 to be seen. So many had been killed by the persistent means taken 

 for their destruction that it is thought that they must have been 

 nearly exterminated, and hopes are entertained that another autumnal 

 visit may not be received from them. 



Annual visitations of the same fly had occurred for at least five or six 

 years past. They had not been noticed in any other dwelling in the 

 vicinity. This house was quite alone from any other. 



Conjecture as to their Source. 

 In reply to the inquiry made of me of the probable source of these 

 flies, answer was returned that several of the Oscinidce are known to 

 breed in the stems and roots of the Graminece (grass family), and that the 

 breeding-places of the Franklin chloroj)S might, perhaps, be discovered 

 in some of the neighboring grain fields, if they gave evidence of being 

 infested. To this, reply was made that within many miles of the place, 

 very little grain was grown and there was none that had been infested 



