INSECTS INJURIOUS IN 1902. 39 
In Ohio in 1900 members of this genus (H. calignosus) were 
reported as injuring strawberries, and probably attacked straw- 
berries before that date. 
In 1892 Harpalus ruficornis caused trouble in the same way in 
Holland, and Miss Ormerod mentions the same injury in England 
in her Reports for 1894, ’95 and ’97-’99. 
REMEDIES. 
There are various ways of combating this pest in the straw- 
berry patch. They work entirely at night and during the season 
of their abundance it is barely possible that the lantern trap may 
be effective, though I have not had any experience with the same. 
It is worth trying. The lantern trap consists of a pan two-thirds 
full of water upon which water a generous layer of kerosene has 
been poured. This pan is put upon a post in the strawberry 
patch about two feet above the ground, say, and above the pan 
is suspended a lantern; or the lantern rests upon a brick placed 
in the pan. The beetles attracted by the light fall into the kero- 
sene and are killed. Several such traps put about the strawberry 
patch might materially reduce the number of beetles. Bran mixed 
with water, sweetened with molasses and poisoned with Paris 
Green if distributed under boards and other protected situations 
in the strawberry patch is also said to be fairly effective. It 
would of course be fatal to any fowl which had found its way 
into the strawberry patch. 
Some berry raisers have put cheap meat such as lights from 
sheep, or calves, in basins, the basins being sunk in the ground 
up to their top. They are examined every morning and the 
beetles which fall into the pans collected and killed. This insect 
became at one time such a serious pest in Pennsylvania that chil- 
dren were employed to go through the strawberry patches and 
pick the beetles from under the mulching and elsewhere! Fifteen 
or twenty dollars or even three times those sums spent in this way, 
if it will save two or three or four hundred dollars on the straw- 
berry crop is money well expended. Another suggestion is to 
place boards throughout the strawberry field and look under them 
every morning, catching and killing the beetles found there. If 
there is anything like Rag Weed growing about the strawberry 
patch it should be destroyed. 
