152 THE PLUM CURCULIO. 
PREDACEOUS INSECTS. 
Several species of predatory insects are recorded as attacking the 
curculio, especially in the larval stage, though their importance is 
difficult to estimate. In our own investigations ants have been 
found to be efficient enemies of curculio larve as they are leaving the 
fruit and entering the soil. Numerous observations in peach orchards 
in Georgia show that these creatures are ever on the alert for an 
insect as food, and seek out and quickly destroy curculio larve or 
other soft-bodied insects. Mr. Girault, and also Mr. Rosenfeld, 
record frequent observations of ants attacking larve in the course of 
breeding work at Myrtle, Ga., interfering greatly with the experi- 
ments. Thus on June 16 a large number of larvee were placed on the 
soul in a box for pupal records. These, however, were soon dis- 
covered by the ant, Dorymyrmex pyramicus Roger, which destroyed 
numbers of larve before they could be driven off. Within a quarter 
of an hour ants were literally swarming over the soil, in the box, 
and very few larve succeeded in getting any distance into the soil 
before being attacked and destroyed. 
In the course of timing larve in entering the soil in cultivated 
orchards, these were often found and attacked by one or more ants 
(Dorymyrmex pyramicus Roger), usually with fatal results to the 
larva. Thus, a larva placed on the soil at 4.23 p. m. (May 30, 1906) 
was attacked eight times in succession by ants, which were repelled 
each time, but succeeded at the ninth attack—at 4.33 p.m. This 
species is especially common in Georgia orchards, and in the aggre- 
gate must exert an important influence in destruction of the curculio. 
Aspecies of thrips is recorded by Riley (2d Mo. Rept., p. 6) as very 
effective in destroying the eggs of the curculio. 
Mr. Walsh, in an interesting article in the American Entomologist 
for 1868, page 33, gave observations on certain insects regarded by him 
as predatory on the curculio. These observations are given by Riley 
in his Missouri Report (p. 56), and the substance appears in Riley and 
Howard’s well-known article on the “Plum curculio.”” There can 
be no doubt whatever as to the accuracy of Mr. Walsh’s observations, 
but practically nothing has since been added to our knowledge of the 
usefulness of these insects in destroying the curculio 
A larva of a species of lacewing (Chrysopa) was observed by Walsh 
in one side of a peach badly bored by a curculio. It was actually 
feeding upon a curculio larva, one-half of which had already been 
sucked dry. One of these insects is shown in figure 31. They are 
well known to feed upon various soft-bodied insects, especially 
plant-lice. 
A carabid beetle, Aspidoglossa subangularis Chaud., was found inside 
a peach completely excavated by the curculio, from which Mr. Walsh 
concluded that this species also was an enemy of the curculio. These 
two species were regarded as undoubtedly predatory on the curculio 
