GRASSHOPPERS AND OTHER INJURIOUS INSECTS OF 1911 AND 1912. 77 



vant's quarters, until some day the housewife, not dreaming that 

 the house is afflicted, is dismayed to note their presence in one or 

 more rooms occupied by the family. 



Life History. — The bedbug belongs to the order Hemiptera, 

 the family Cimicidse, and is a true bug. The accompanying illus- 

 tration may give one an idea of the insect, which is pale yellow, 

 more or less translucent, or brownish, or mahogany color if filled 

 with food. It may show different degrees of red, depending upon 

 the amount of blood it has absorbed. Like other true bugs, it feeds 

 by inserting its beak-like proboscis through the skin, and as is very 

 apparent, may well be the cause of infecting a human being with an 

 infectious or contagious disease, the germs of which it may have 

 obtained from a previous victim. 



That bedbugs can go a long time without food is a well known 

 fact (one is recorded as having been kept alive in a bottle for a year 

 without nourishment) naturally losing color as the result of pro- 

 longed fasting, and even migrating, it is said, from one dwelling 

 left unoccupied for some time and, in consequence, foodless, to an- 

 other house, where the presence of human beings promises an abun- 

 dance of nourishment. Fortunately for those of us who are obliged 

 to travel considerably, these bugs are not active in winter. Associ- 

 ated with man, practically everyw^here in the world, they have from 

 time immemorial, apparently, regarded him as their special prey, 

 not only to feast upon, but also to be avoided at times when he is 

 awake, for they are strictly nocturnal in their 

 habits, scurrying to their places of concealment 

 in cracks or crevices of bedsteads, walls, mop 

 boards, and the like, and under torn wall paper, 

 at the coming of daylight. Depressed in shape, 

 they are especially adapted to crawling into 

 narrow cracks, and between two flat surfaces 

 quite closely opposed. 



The yellowish, white eggs, varying consid- 

 erably in number (from six to fifty some writ- 

 ers state) are laid in cracks on bedsteads wains- 

 coting, mop boards, under torn wall paper pos- 

 sibly, and wherever concealment is offered, pjg. sg. E^gg of Bedbug. 

 These eggs hatch in about a week, and the cycle Enlarged. Lugger. 

 from and including the egg stage to the adult is said to be about 

 seven weeks. Young and old have the offensive "buggy" odor, 



