352 FIFTH REPORT OF THE ENTOMOLOGICAL COMMISSION. 



"way out, and enter the ground in the autumn to transform, others delay 

 until the spring-. The worm devours nearly a thinl or one-half of t!ie 

 interior of the nut, part of the cavity being tilled with the castings of 



/^ 



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r '.•>i^.-J^ 



Fig. 132.— Cheatnut Maggot, a, a second, better drawn, view ; h, head.— From Packard. 



the worm. As the grub is white it is liable to be overlooked and 

 eaten with the chestnut; it makes its exit through a round hole in the 

 shell. 



The larva is about a third of an inch long, cylindrical, and of nearly 

 the same thickness from the head to the tail. It is completely footless, 

 as are nearly all nut-inhabiting larv*. It is very difQcuIt to rear this 

 insect, as I have found after successive trials, and I am indebted to 

 Mr. G. Mooney, of Providence, R. I., for a fresh male and female 

 beetle reared by him from chestnuts collected in Providence. On send- 

 ing one of the specimens to Dr. G. H. Horn, he kindly identified it as 

 Balaninns caryatripes. 



To those who raise chestnuts or gather them for the market, the rav- 

 ages of this grub are of no small importance. The following letter will 

 give the reader an idea of the interest attached to this subject. 



MooRESTOWN, N. J., October 2G, 1882. 

 I would be very much obliged to you if you will give uie some information con- 

 cerning the insect that destroys the fruit of the chestnut tree; its name, so that I 

 can find it in the "Guide to the Study of Insects," etc., which I have in vain tried 

 to do ; and how to destroy it. My Spanish chestnuts are ruined by it. Not one-third 

 are sound. Notwithstanding the crop last year was a total failure — no fruit at all — 

 this autumn an unprecedented amount of the worms Infest a good crop of the fruit. 

 Where the beetle last year deposited its eggs to raise such a crop for this year is beyond 

 my comprehension. 



Respectfully, etc., 



S. C. Thornton. 



Dr. Le Conte, in his work on " The Rhynchophora of America," 

 remarks that the beak of these weevils "attains in length and attenua- 

 tion the greatest development ; in the male it is rarely shorter than the 

 body ; in the female it is frequently twice the length, and is used to 

 make the perforation into which the egg is subsequently introduced. 

 The great thickness of the husks of the fruits (chestnuts, walnuts, 

 hickory nuts, etc.) depredated on by these insects necessitates a very 

 long perforating instrument to reach the kernel, upon which the larva 

 feeds." 



