GRASSHOPPERS AND OTHER INJURIOUS INSECTS OF 1911 AND 1912. 15 



ing secondary in economic importance three years ago, it took the 

 lead in that year as being the most abundant of injurious forms. 

 As a fact accessory to the abundance of grasshoppers in Minnesota 

 in 1909, 1910 and 1911, it is to be remarked that a Meloid beetle, 

 Macrobasis unicolo)', and possibly one other species, commonly 

 known as Blister Beetles, were extremely abundant and injurious in 

 our state during the early part of 1911. This, without question, is 

 to be ascribed to the great abundance of grasshoppers upon the eggs 

 of which the young of these beetles feed. See page 44. 



Fijr. 10. Rocky Mountain Locust, (3/. xpretus)1. showing: genital plates 

 of male Collected in 1911. Somes. 



Ecological Notes: 



From Mr. Somes' report for 1911 and Mr. Howard's for 1912, 

 the following facts bearing upon life histories are deduced. 



Mr. Somes noted Melanoplus bivittatns drilling in hard packed 

 soil of roadbeds and on one occasion at Crookston one was watched 

 for some time busily drilling in a hard cinder walk in a city park. 

 All species appear to prefer dry and rather film soil. The Oedipo- 

 dlnae will deposit in much softer or more friable soil than the Acri- 

 didae. In examining various localities for eggs this fall, they were 

 found very abundant in a piece of land which had been plowed in 

 July (the "nests" averaged 9 or 10 per sq. yd.) so that the statement 

 30 often made — that they will not oviposit in plowed land — is un- 

 true. A number of counts made in corn land showed relatively few 

 egg masses and these for the most part only at the edges of the 

 fields. In stubble, especially in flax, they were most plenty, running 

 as high in one case as 14 masses to one square yard. 



The fact that eggs are deposited in low ground that may be 

 under water in the spring does not necessarily mean that these eggs 

 are doomed. Indeed it has been noted in portions of the Red River 

 Valley that young hoppers emerge in July instead of May from 

 some spots where water had been standing through the early part of 



