THE PRACTICAL ENTOMOLOGIST. 



33 



again as "pyrivora, or the Pear blistering-fly," stating 

 that "it eats the young pears voraciously in June, and in 

 a short time destroys all or nearly all upon the tree." (JV. 

 r. Hep. II, J 5S). Last of all, after the insect had been 

 described by three preceding authors, and named by two 

 of them, comes Mr. Stauller, and supposes that "it is not 

 generally known to Entomologists." I have myself taken 

 it on wild flowers near Rock Island, III., but it is very 

 rare there. The species is dark metallic-green, with red 

 legs and black knees and tarsi, and is the size and shape 

 of the Striped Blister-beetle, figured on page 2G of this 

 number. ■ 



4th. All root-feeding insects may be starved out and 

 destroyed by perpetually plowing the land, so as to suffer 

 no plant whatever to grow therein. But in an Orchard 

 you cannot do this, because the roots of the trees must 

 not be destroyed, and eonsenueutly there will always be 

 food there for root-feeders. I do not believe that plowing 

 or digging would at all bother underground larva;, ex- 

 cept by subjecting them for a short time to be preyed on 

 by crows, robins, &e. Shortly after being exposed to the 

 light of day, thcv will just "gather themselves up," as 

 we say in the We"st. and burrow underground again. But 

 with such Beetles, Moths and Flics, as are already in the 



Eupa state and consequently inactive, it would no doubt 

 av6 a beneficial tendency, because it would be apt to 

 place them in unnatural conditions, too high or too low 

 in the earth, too airy or not airy enough, too wet or too 

 dry, Ac, and thereby eventually cause their death. I 

 have no faith whatever in the application to the soil of 

 salt, lime, aslys, &c. in order to destroy insects. A dose 

 heavy enough to kill insects will kill plants at the same 

 time'; and smaller doses will kill neither. 



5th. I do not believe that evergreen hedges are likely 

 to shelter such insects as peculiarly afllict the Orchard. 

 Evertjreens have, as you justly remark, their own peculi- 

 ar insects, but these are none of them such as likewise 

 make war upon fruit-trees. For example, the " Basket- 

 wornfs" that you speak of, which I suppose are the lar- 

 vse of Th>iruloptcry.c cphemeraformis, otherwise known as 

 "bag-worms," (See Answer to C. P. Wickersham, Pa., in 

 Pii.vcTu-Ai. E-NTOMOLOiiisT II, p. 22) nevcr have been known, 

 I believe, to attack any of the trees grown in our or- 

 chards for fruit. 



Otli. All known spiders are cannibals, chiefly feeding 

 upon insects, though they are by no means particular as 

 to the good or bad character of the species they prey on, 

 whether it be a plant-feeder, or a cannibal like them- 

 selves, or a parasite. Sometimes they mete out retribu- 

 tive justice in rather an amusing way. The common 

 black and yellow Mud-wasp, (-Pe/ojKKu.s/unaiiw), as is well 

 known, provisions its nest with a small greenish-yellow 

 spider, which spins no web, but haunts flowers, and lives 

 by catching such insects as visit those flowers for the 

 sake of their honey and pollen. Last summer I saw a 

 large web-spinning spider envelop one of these Mud- 

 wasps in his net in an out-building of mine, after a long 

 and severe contest; and the next day I found the Mud- 

 wasp dead and sucked as dry as a bone. Thus the raven- 

 ous spider-killer succumbed to a spider. The so-called 

 "Eed Spider" that infests greenhouses {Erythrceus tclari- 

 us) is not a true Spider, but a mite. On the whole, the in- 

 fluence of Spiders upon the insect-world is generally be- 

 neficial to us, and they ought by no manner of means to 

 be disturbed in their operations. 



Your statement that "Click-beetles" [E/akr family] as 

 well as Blister-beetles make holes in fruit is quite a new 

 fact. Are you sure that you have not mistaken some 

 other insect for a •' Click-beetle ?" Please send me speci- 

 mens next summer, that I may identify the species. 

 None of the Bees destroy other insects, except a few Cuc- 

 koo-bees, which, like our Cow-bird and the European 

 Cuckoo, lay their eggs in the nests of other Bees, the lar- 

 vae proceeding from which eggs starve out or, as I believe, 

 destroy the rightful tenant and appropriate the food laid 

 up for him. As to Wasps, there are hosts of them, and it 

 requires very consideraljle knowledge of Entomology to 

 distinguish one kind from another, each kiud having its 

 peculiar habits. As a general rule most Wasps catch in- 

 sects for their young, each species afi'ecting a certain 

 group of insects as its prey ; but they themselves feed up- 

 on honey, pollen, &c. The Social Wasps (Hornets and 

 Yellow-jackets) are more exclusively vegetable-feeders 

 in the l.arva state, but by no means entirely so. Some 

 of the Cuckoo- bees referred to bi^fore, (genus NoTtmda), re- 



semble wasps very much, and would be taken for wasps 

 by anybody but a professed entomologist. As a general 

 rule, the influence of wasps is beneficial to man, and they 

 should not be disturbed, except when they trouble ripe 

 fruit. In England, under such circumstances, they are 

 commonly caught in large numbers by hanging up nar- 

 row-mouthed phials, half full of sweetened water or 

 sweetened beer, on the infested fruit-trees. 



ANSWERS TO CORRESPONDENTS. 



M. S. Hill, Ohio.— The two Cicada (popularly called 

 "Locusts,") that you send, are the two sexes of the com- 

 mon 17-year Cicada, {Cicada septendecim.) You observe 

 that they are "scarcely half the size of the common 17- 

 year Locust and much darker underneath, that their 

 song is entirely difierent, and that they are much less 

 abundant." You must have mistaken some of the larger 

 species of Cicada for the true 17-year species. One of 

 these, which I believe is undeseribed, has the same yel- 

 low wing-veins as the 17-year species, but is distinguish- 

 able by being proportionally much stouter, by the thorax 

 being conspicuously marked with yellow, and by the size 

 being almost twice as great. If this large species swarm- 

 ed with you in 1866, it is a new fact. I have but a single 

 specimen in my cabinet, and should be obliged if you 

 could furnish me with more. 



You say that "in 1864 all the gooseberry bushes in your 

 vicinity were entirely stripped of their leaves by a small 

 green worm, about i inch in length. In 1865 it again 

 made its appear.ance, but not in such great numbers, 

 while in 1866 you have not seen a single worm." You 

 further remark that "you cannot state positively whether 

 they were marked with rows of black spots or not." The 

 spots on the larva of the Imported Gooseberry Sawfly {Ne- 

 matus ventricosu.^) are so conspicuous, that you could 

 scarcely fail to observe them ; and besides, if it had been 

 this species that troubled you, it would not have gradual- 

 ly disappeared in 1865 and 1866. Hence I infer that your 

 species was my Priatiphora grossularice, or the Native 

 Gooseberry Sawfly, which as you will see from the answer 

 to Isaac Hicks of Kew York. (Practical Entomolo- 

 gist II, p. 20) seems to have appeared in other States be- 

 sides Ohio, from time to time. It is perpetually the case 

 that after a new Insect has been once described and 

 brought into general notice, it turns out to be quite 

 common in a variety of difterent localities. 



Miss Marion Hobart, 111.— The small roughish tuber- 

 cles so thickly set on a piece of dry twig, are probably 

 caused by the puncture of some insect; but they do not 

 now contain, and have not previously contained any eggs. 

 The bald-faced hornet, ( Vexpa maculata), which suspends 

 its large paper nest to the boughs of trees, like all other 

 species of that genus, including the common "Yellow- 

 jackets," of which in Illinois we have sever.al species, 

 breaks up housekeeping when the weather begins to turn 

 cold in the autumn. The workers then all perish, as well 

 as the drones or males; but the large females retire un- 

 der very rotten logs half buried in the ground, in which 

 situation I have repeatedly found them early in the fol- 

 lowing spring, and pass the winter there in a torpid state. 

 As soon as the spring opens, each female hornet comes 

 forth into the open air again and becomes the founder of 

 a new colony. It was formerly supposed that the work- 

 ers in this genus were barren and laid no eggs, or at all 

 events nothing but eggs that produced male wasps. But 

 according to the distmguished English Hymeuopterist, 

 Mr. Fred. Smith, it has been demonstrated by Dr. Orme- 

 rod, Mr. Stone and others, that worker wasps can and do 

 lay eggs that produce other worker wasps. The proof of 

 this very remarkable fact is simple. A nest containing 

 a single female and several workers is in early spring de- 

 prived of the female ; and it is found that the building of 

 fresh cells and the production of fresh workers therein, 

 goes on as successfully as if the mother-female had re- 

 mained in the nest. (Stainton's Entomological Annual, 

 1861, p. 39.) Whether these worker wasps are capable of 

 generating, in the autumn, females of the usual large size, 

 to continue the breed for another year, does not appear 

 to have been as yet ascertained. The whole subject is a 

 very curious one, and is recommended to the attention 

 of entomological observers, as it involves many very cu- 



