60 INSECTS INJURIOUS IN 1902. 
and leaves. These insects can be controlled by several applica- 
tions of Paris Green, dusted dry or sprinkled on the plant in 
liquid form. When Paris Green is used in water, take two table- 
spoonfuls of the poison to one pailful of water. If a quart of 
lime water or milk of lime is added to the water it will further 
insure the safety of the foliage. 
The family Meloidae to which these Beetles belong has a curi- 
ous characteristic, viz., although the adults are destructive to 
plants their young, hatching from the eggs laid in the ground, feed 
upon destructive insects or their eggs. 
The species under discussion M. unicolor, is very active as 
a larva in eating the eggs of grasshoppers, and this fact should 
bid us pause before destroying the adults, unless the injury caused 
by them is very serious. 
THE PLUM-GOUGER. 
Coccotorus scutellaris, Lec. 
This Snout Beetle is probably the worst enemy of the fruit 
raiser in Minnesota, not excepting the Plum Curculio. 
In September specimens were received from Luverne, with 
the statement that they had gathered upon the outside of sacks 
which had been filled with plums. The above picture, from a. 
report of the late Prof. Lugger, illustrates this species very well. 
The Plum Gouger is a reddish brown Beetle, with peculiar 
minute tufts of hair on its upper surface. The Beetle not only 
punctures the formed fruit, but also the ovary of the flower be- 
fore the petals form. The egg-laying is a curious process, a 
round hole being made in the fruit into which a single egg is 
dropped. This is practically true of all the members of this 
great group of Snout Beetles, containing nearly or quite 25,000 
known species, the beak, in the female at least, being used to pre- 
pare a place for the egg, and sometimes to push it to the bottom 
of the hole. The puncture soon heals, closing in the egg. Un- 
like the Plum Curculio, this Beetle larva feeds not only upon the 
flesh of the plum, but bores into the pit and eats the kernel. It 
changes to a Beetle in time to seek winter quarters near by. 
Plums which drop prematurely as a result of this injury should 
be collected and destroyed. From the fact that the grub is en- 
i 
