REPORT OF THE ENTOMOLOGIST. 545 



Tis under date of May 23, 1885, sending specimens, and again on June 1 9. 

 Mr. Coquillett, writing from Atwater, Merced County, California, 

 June 29, sent similar specimens, Mr. Donkin, in Ms first letter, said: 

 " They are killing a large percentage of our wheat. The heads turn 

 yellow and die long before the wheat rij)ens." In his second letter 

 he supplemented this as follows: "I send you by this mail samples 

 of wheat-straw taken from different fields several miles apart. I am 

 told by friends who have been growing wheat for years on the same 

 land that the worms are in all the wheat this year. They have found 

 it in the wheat of every field examined. There is a difference of opin- 

 ion about the damage done by it. Some say that when we have plenty 

 of rain and the wheat is thrifty it does no harm. One told me that 

 he had noticed pieces of about one-eighth of an acre in extent where 

 about one-eighth of the heads had no wheat. Last year was the first 

 that I saw any myself." 



That this insect has existed in California for a number of years 

 there can be no doubt from the evidence of correspondents. It is 

 probably the same insect which was sent to Dr. Packard through the 

 Pacific Rural Press in September, 1879, from Healdsburg, Sonoma 

 County, California, and which was identified by him as a wingless 

 Joint Worm. Other specimens were received by him the same year 

 from Madison, Yolo County. It was also received by us in Septem- 

 ber, 1882, from Mr. J. A. Starner, of Dayton, Columbia County, 

 Washington Territory, in stalks which contained larvse and pupae. 

 Although the work and early stages were precisely similar to those 

 of tritici, the great difference in locality led to the presumption that 

 it might be a different though related species, but subsequent breed- 

 ing of the adults settled the question of identity. * 



The presence of this insect in the other States mentioned has already 

 been placed on record, with the exception of Kansas. From this State 

 we received specimens in July, 1885, from Mr. Warren Knaus, of Sa- 

 lina. The straws contained larvae which were dried up on receipt, 

 so that it was impossible to say to which form they belonged. The 

 work in the straws indicated either tritici or grande, while the date 

 of collecting (July 5) rendered it more probable that they were 

 grande. As this is the first recorded finding of Isosoma in Kansas, 

 we may quote briefly from Mr. Knaus' account: 



*'I mail you to-day a box containing specimens of what I take to be 

 Isosoma tritici. The joints infested are all the second from the ground, 

 and are the only ones in the stalk of wheat containing the worm. 

 Stalks from various fields are almost all infested, many containing 

 three larvse. I have taken a number of larvae from immediately above 

 the joint next the head. My observation is that these worms have 

 caused more damage to the wheat in this part of the State than the 

 Hessian Fly fully 50 per cent, of the heads in many fields of wheat 

 showing their work in a very marked manner." 



In a letter dated August 16 he gives the following: 



" I have just returned from a trip through Northwest Kansas, and 

 find that the Wheat-straw Worm has seriously damaged the wheat 

 in the counties of Ottawa, Cloud, Osborne, Rooks, and Phillips; also 

 in Saline, McPherson, and Dickinson Counties. It has really done 

 more damaged than the Hessian Fly." 



In order to compare the customary situation and abundance of the 

 larvae in the straw in California with Mr. Knaus' statement and with 



*See American Naturalist, December, 1883, p. 1017. 

 35 AG— '86 



