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GENERAL RECORD FOR 1891 AND 1892. 
The economic entomology of the years 1891 and 1892 has presented 
in Illinois scarcely a single notable feature, all crops having been, on 
the whole, unusually free from insect injury, and no very serious < danger 
threatening at any time. 
m:> -.'The most interesting item of our record was the attack on young 
corn made in May ‘and June, 1891, throughout the greater part of the 
State, from extreme Northern Illinois to Bunker Hill, but especially in 
the central and southern counties, by a small black jumping FLEA-BEETLE, 
~Chaetocnema pulicaria, previously wholly insignificant as a corn insect. 
From five to ten or more of these beetles might sometimes be found on a 
single blade of young corn not more than five or six inches high, and the 
_ damage done was often so great as to give a yellow look to the entire 
a - field, ‘due to the deadening of the ter minal part of the leaf beyond the 
spots affected 2 the micrgscopic gnawing of those beetles. The injury 
was magnified by the cold weather of the season, during which the corn 
made very little growth; and it practically vanished with the advent of 
good growing weather. 
The cHINcCH BUG, which in 1889 and 1890 had very nearly disap- 
peared as an important factor in the agriculture of this State, has begun 
during the two years just passed again to take the upward turn. 
The almost uniformly high temperature of the spring and summer 
of 1890 and 1891 in northern and in southern Central Illinois, combined 
with light rainfall, amounting in some counties to little less than con- 
tinuous drouth, favored its development unusually in these sections. 
South of Central Illinois, the region affected in 1891 was a belt 
of counties extending from about the line of the Ohio & Mississippi Rail- 
road northward to the latitude of Springfield, and local injury seemed 
likely for some distance north of this. In the north, the infested district 
was a roughly triangular area in the northeastern corner of the State, 
of which Stephenson county marks the western angle and Kankakee 
county the southern. he distribution of injury within these limits was, 
of course, extremely variable, as is shown by the following examples of 
field notes and correspondence for 18914 first for Sourhicen Illinois, and 
then for the northern part of the State. 
WaAsHINGTON.—Nashville, July 8. ‘Very destructive to corn in places.” 
Dec. 7. Bugs generally diffused in limited numbers. Ashley, Dec. 7. Bugs 
- generally diffused. Injury to wheat slight; corn more hurt. 
; Crinton.—Carlyle, April 8 and 9. Hibernating in rail fences, corn shocks, 
etc. Second year here. Corn and wheat suffered some in 1890. Dec, 11. 
_ A few bugs. No harm done. 
. Marton.—Vernon, July 1. “Leaving wheat for corn. Threaten injury.” 
_ Salem, Dec. 9. A few bugs in corn. Odin, Sept. 27. In large quantities 
in one field of corn. Dec. 10. Locally abundant. 
Bonp.—Greenville, June 27. “Corn alive with them.” Dec. 3. Reported 
present in limited numbers last season. Effects seen mostly on corn; 
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