306 ANNUAL REPORT. 



the insect world. They are as beautiful and as ferocious, in their small way, as 

 are the warm-blooded felines of the African and Asiatic jungles after which they 

 are named. 



The Tiger beetles are of medium size, varying in length from one-half to three - 

 fourths of an inch; the form is slender and graceful with the head set on vertically, 

 and the colors are various shades of metallic green or purple, marked and dotted 

 with pale yellow or white. The legs are long and the insects run with surprising 

 rapidity. When pursued they make a series of short, swift flights alighting about 

 every rod. The larvte are most repulsive looking grubs, having an enormous head 

 and jagged jaws, and the body being furnished with long, sprawling legs and several 

 hooks and horns, by which they sustain themselves in their perpendicular burrows. 

 They live in tunnels from ten to twelve inches deep and about as large around as 

 a common lead pencil and generally bored in hard ground. At the mouth of its 

 tunnel the larva lies in wait for any unsuspecting insect that may happen along, 

 which it seizes in a twinkling and drags to its under-ground den and devours. 



The ground beetles {Carabidoe) are one of the largest families of the Coleoptera and 

 are of many sizes, shapes and colors. Some of the larger species are very beautiful. 

 They are regular hunters, running swiftly over the ground with the head slightly 

 bent, the antennte projected forward and the sharp jaws apart, and very few insects 

 which they scent escape them. The larvte are horny, flattened grubs which are as 

 active in burrowing in all directions underground in search of soft bodied grubs 

 and caterpillars, as the perfect insects are in pursuit of their prey on the surface. 

 A very useful species is the Rummaging ground-beetle {Galosoma Scrutator). This 

 handsome follow is over an inch long with wing covers of a bright metallic green 

 color, and the head and otlter parts of the body purple and blue or green with golden 

 reflections. It kills great numbers of the larvte of the Colorado potato-beetle, the 

 Codling moth and the Curculio before they transform, and its larvie is just as 

 greedy in devouring the species that have entered the ground. 



Another species equally valuable and almost as attractive is the Fiery ground- 

 beetle (CaZ(?8o?w« caKdiwm.) This is somewhat smaller than scrutator, of a black 

 color thickly dotted with large, bright, coppery spots arranged in rows on the 

 wing covers. 



A third species, the Elongate ground-beetle [Pasimachus elongatus), is of a smooth 

 shining, jet black color, bordered all around with deep blue. This beetle has a 

 very broad head and conspicuous jaws and other mouth parts. The only other 

 member of this group which I shall mention here is the murky ground-beetle 

 (Harpalus calignosus.) This has not so much beauty to commend it to our notice, 

 being entirely of a plain, dull black color, but it has proved itself of service in the 

 exterminating of various leaf- feeders that prey upon our crops. 



Everybody knows the trim little Lady birds (Cocci iielidoi) with their red or or- 

 ange black-spotted coats. They are of round or oval form, and rather small size, 

 the largest not more than one-third of an inch long. The perfect beetles are some- 

 times found on flowers, but more frequently on leaves and stems infested 

 with plant-lice or bark-lice which they themselves do not feed upon, but among 

 which they deposit their eggs, and the awkward, ugly larvae which hatch therefrom 

 very soon dispatch a whole colony of the tender Aphides or young Coccidae. There 

 are a great number of species, some of wLich are very small, only one of which 

 feeds in its larvtv slate on vegetation, aiid that is quite rare. 



