8 Farmers’ Bulletin 1223. 
roots of the food plant upon which it lives. During the summer 
the bugs may be found among the roots just beneath the surface of 
the soil, under leaf sheaths, in the leaf curls, and in the heads of 
such crops as corn, kafir, milo, feterita, Sudan grass, etc. They may 
also often be found under clods of earth, fallen leaves, and almost 
any other shelter existing between the rows of corn or other crops. 
Immediately after hatching, the young chinch bug is about 0.04 
inch in length; the head and thorax are brown; the eyes are dark 
red; and the abdomen ranges from yellowish white to light red in 
color. The tip of the abdomen is black. The second, third, and 
fourth stages of the insect are similar to the very young bugs (fig. 2, 
b, c, d), except that the abdomen becomes a darker red in color and 
spotted with black. The wing pads appear in the fourth stage or 
instar, and the abdomen becomes banded with red and black. The 
fifth instar or pupa (fig. 2, e) is about one-sixth of an inch in length, 
the head and thorax are black and polished, and most of the abdomen 
is dark red, with the exception of the tip, which is black. At a little 
distance the entire abdomen appears black. The sixth stage is the 
fully developed insect or adult. 
FOOD PLANTS. 
Over the western part of the country, from Indiana to Texas, the 
principal crops damaged are wheat, field and garden corn, the mil- 
lets (including Hungarian grass) ,? and the sorghums,’ including cane, 
kafir, milo, broom corn, shallu, feterita, Sudan grass, kaoliang, and 
durra. An outbreak usually originates in wheat, rye, or barley fields, 
from which the bugs migrate to near-by fields of corn and sorghum, 
beginning shortly before the small grain is ripe and passing over in 
great numbers shortly after it is harvested. In the northeastern part 
of the country, where the forage sorghums are replaced by timothy, 
the migrating bugs are quite as likely to be attracted to the timothy 
meadows as to corn, where both are within equally easy reach. Rye, 
barley, and oats are less subject to severe damage than wheat, The 
chinch bug is said to attack sugar cane in Mexico. 
Among its less important food plants may be mentioned such 
forage grasses as Johnson grass,‘ emmer,’ spelt, bluegrass," and 
prairie grasses. The bugs also develop to some extent on such wild 
grasses as bottle-brush grass,® little bluestem,’ big bluestem,’ 
2 Chaetochloa italica, ssp. nigrofructa vy. atra Hubb. 
8 Holcus sorghum UL. 
4 Holeus halipensis L. 
5 Triticum sativum dicoccum Schrank. 
6 Triticum sativum spelta Hackel. 
7 Poa pratensis L. 
8 Hystriv patula Moench. 
® Andropogon scoparius Michx. 
0 Andropogon provincialis Lam, 
