INTEODUTCIOJSr. 



To His Excellency, John M. Palmer, 



Governor of the State of Illinois: 



Sir — Having been called by your appointment to fill the va- 

 cancy in the office of State Entomologist, caused by the sudden 

 and accidental death, of Benjamin D. Walsh, whose untimely loss 

 scientific and economic entomology equally deplore, I herevs^ith 

 present my first annual report, in compliance with the require- 

 ment of the law by which this office was established, and in fur- 

 therance of the objects which my lamented predecessor had so 

 much at heart. 



My attention has been so much diverted, for several years past, 

 from the study of insects, by the pressure of professional and 

 other duties, that I have not been able, in most instances, to make 

 th^se continuous observations which are essential to the complete 

 elucidation of the history of species. The present publication, 

 therefore, will be in the main, what its title implies, a report of 

 my observations in practical entomology for the season just past. 



The history of many of our noxious insects, and especially the 

 most notorious of them, has been pretty thoroughly traced, not 

 only by the entomologists expressly emplo^^ed by several of the 

 States for this purpose, but also by many other active gleaners in 

 this field. Still, any one who enters upon the study of this ex- 

 tensive subject, soon finds work enough upon his hands. It can- 

 not be said that the history of any insect is perfectly and abso- 

 lutely known,' and it is a notorious fact that some of the insects 

 which have been longest known and studied, such as the Plum 

 Curculio and the Apple "Worm, are the very ones which are cans- 



