LAOHNOSTFRNA CRIBROSA. 



17 



If near the old hole, ii ))eetle will n«e it ag-ain; otherwise a new one i.s 

 ([uickl}' made, and in a few minutes the beetle will have disappeared. 

 The beetles were usually found about 3 inches deep in the soil, but 

 Mr. Burton stated that he had found them in burrows running hori 

 zontally to a vertical burrow some 4 or 5 inches deep. A hundred 

 of the beetles were picked up around the edge of a cotton Held in a few 

 minutes. Some of them emerged from ground which had been covered 

 with water, but seemed none the worse for it. They are exceedingly 

 awkward, and when disturbed feign death, remaining in any conceiv- 

 able position for several minutes. For the past two years they had 

 destroyed peanuts and had injured strawberries, grape cuttings, and 

 cowpeas in this locality. Young cotton was attacked in preference to 

 anything but ragweed, which is the fav^orite food plant. When 

 observed they were feeding on the rag'weed along the fences around 

 cotton. This is the usual place for them to appear. Subsequently^ 

 they spread into the cotton, doing- injury 

 along the edges. One beetle is said to de- 

 stroy a cotton plant <) or 8 inches high 

 during its evening meal. A number of 

 beetles were observed to emerge in young- 

 corn. They did not feed, however, and 

 many of those found were dead. They 

 were not found in meadow land. During 

 the previous year cotton had been planted 

 on land where grain had been grown the 

 year before. After the grain was cut the 

 land had been left for the remainder of 

 the season to grow up to weeds, and it was 

 not plowed until late the next spring, just 

 before planting cotton. In this tield the extent of injury to cotton 

 was unprecedented. The cotton planted in 1904 was on land which 

 had been well plowed and kept free from weeds during the previous 

 fall and winter, and in this case the injur}" was not serious. The 

 beetles do not seem to be injurious on land following corn. It seems 

 probable that the females oviposit in cotton land and that if this 

 is well cultivated and winter plowed the larva? are killed. Larvte 

 feeding on the roots of weeds along the fences where plowing is 

 impossible will, of course, survive this treatment, but the number of 

 adults emerging in the spring will be comparatively very small. 



On July 14, 1904, injury by this insect was observed along one end 

 of a small piece of cotton at Wichita Falls, the land having been in 

 wheat during'the previous season. At this time the beetles had prac- 

 tically all disappeared, althotigh they were present in great numbers a 

 few days previously. 



Fig. 6. — Lachnostenia crtbro^a: fe- 

 male — enlarged (author's illustra- 

 tion). 



15109— No. 57—06- 



