or cultivated grasses formed a part of its diet. Nothing of the 

 kind was found in any of the cultivated grasses, either the annual 

 or perennial, but a worm was found in the center of the culms of 

 Elymus Canadensis, or Canada Wild Rye grass, that from its position 

 and manner of work seemed to be the same, but was a little paler 

 in color than the Wheat-stalk worm. Later examinations after the 

 perfect wheat insects began to appear, proved that, while they 

 seemed related to the wheat insects, they were not the same, the 

 fly being about the same length and color, but more slender, less 

 hairy, and all the feet and legs black or fuscous. There was a 

 little difference in the manner of work. While both occupied the 

 center of the calms, the one in the grass was quite as often found 

 in the middle of the int^rnode, or some point a little above the 

 joint or at the joint, while the Wheat-stalk worm was mostly just 

 above the joint. 



At the same time, what was evidently the regular Joint- worm 

 was to be found m the swollen joints of the same species of grass, 

 and another related species, Gymnostichum Hystrix, but no worms 

 were to be found in the center of the culms of the last. Besides 

 these, another worm was found in the culms of Tricuspis Seslerioides, 

 or Tall Eed-top, a coarse wild grass. These were rather more 

 slender than the Wheat-stalk worms, of a white color, and to be 

 found just within the outside hard portion of the culm, in the more 

 spongy tissue, but always outside of the internal hollow. From the 

 course and size of .the burrow, it would seem that the egg was 

 deposited about an inch above the joint or node, and the larva, 

 when hatched, had worked its way downward. On the 29th of 

 November, some stalks of this grass were examined, and the insects 

 infesting them were then in the larva state. In my examinations 

 of wheat stalks, during the summer, one or two specimens were 

 found that resembled these, and might have been the same, though 

 I can make this only as a conjecture. 



As far as the grasses of our immediate locality were concerned, 

 this practically settled the question of grass as a food-plant for the 

 wheat insect. It is true, in the light of Dr. Walsh's conclusions, 

 relating to all the different forms of Joint-worms being identical, 

 the single specimen of perfect insect obtained from the stem of 

 Elymus may have been an aberrent form of the wheat-stalk insect, 

 for all the difference in color, but the structural differences would 

 indicate that it was a different species. The two species of wild 

 barley — Hordeum — common to this State, were not examined, for 

 the reason that H. Jubatum is rare here, and the other species, 

 H. Pratense, is so early a grass that it disappears before harvest 

 time. For this reason I should think it improbable that this grass 

 can form a food-plant for the wheat insect, for it is too short-lived 

 to allow the larva to develop before the stalks would die. 



THE EXTENT OF DAMAGE. 



But little can be said on this part of the subject beyond my per- 

 sonal observations. I find in the American Entomologist for July, 

 1880, (Vol. 3, page 181,) an insect referred to that may perhaps be 



