94 



THE PRACTICAL ENTOMOLOGIST. 



mine ran about 600 lbs. to the acre [an average crop is 

 from 1200 to 1500 lbs]. I thiiili the prospect is worse for 

 next year, as this part of the country is swarming with 

 them. They are on the grupe-vincs and currant-bushes, 

 and everything wliicJi they can live upon. 



When will the world understand, that a decent 

 acquaintance with the rudiments of the Natural 

 History of Insects is of real practical dollars-and- 

 cents' importance to the nation ? Here is a Noxi- 

 ous Insect insidiously spreading by slow degrees 

 over the whole country; and its progress cannot be 

 effectually arrested, because the popular mind be- 

 lieves in the exploded absurdities of' our great- 

 grandfathers ! The Hop-louse has already damaged 

 the Eastern States to the extent of millions of dol- 

 lars annually; and it is to be suffered to run the 

 same destructive course in the West, because "Bugs" 

 are little vermin, that are unworthy the notice of 

 rational men ! 



If the rudiments of Natural History were taught, 

 as they ought to be, in our Public Schools, such 

 lamentable errors as those alluded to above, would 

 not be so common. As much as a hundred years 

 ago, Linnaeus laid it down as a universal law, that 

 every living thing sprang from an egg or seed, or 

 Bome kind of germ. ( Omne vivum ex ouo). But 

 many otherwise well-educated teachers, believe to 

 this day, that frogs are engendered out of mud, 

 and insects out of decaying vegetable matter. 



B. D. w. 



THE WHEAT MIDGE.— Jumping to a conclusion. 



In tlie Maryland Farmer and Mechanic for Aug. 

 1865, I find the following assertion respecting the 

 Wheat Midge, which insect, as it appears, is popu- 

 larly called in Maryland " The Milk Weevil." In 

 the West, farmers know it as " the Red Weevil.'' 



Usually there appears simultaneously with the weevil 

 a parasite called the Platt/gaster punctic/er, which is as 

 destructive to the weevil .as the weevil is to the wheat. 

 Several years ago Dr. Asa Fitch, State Entomologist of 

 New York, was of the opinion that tliis parasite had not 

 yet reached this country; but the experience of this im- 

 mediate section seems conclusive that it has. The wee- 

 vil has appeared at least twice in Franlilin county, but 

 never prevailed three consecutive years. — In 1862 it en- 

 tirely destroyed two patches of late wheat we had, and 

 in 1S63 — 4 it did not appear in any of our fields. The ex- 

 istence of the parasite is also proved by the Ohio Agri- 

 cultural reports of 1860, in which it is sliowu that in forty 

 counties the weevil increased for several years and then 

 disappeared. 



Granting that there really is some parasite that 

 preys on the Wheat Blidge, how does the above 

 prove that that parasite is Phitygaster punctiyer ? 

 The assumption is quite gratuitous. Flatygastcr 

 punctirjer (properly PL jjenetrana *) is one of the 

 three species mentioned by Dr. Fitch, as infesting 

 the Wheat Midge in Europe -j^ and the chances 

 are always about 20 to 1 against any European in- 

 sect being found also in America. 



But, in point of fact, it is proved as clearly as 

 any negative assertion can be proved, that the 

 Wheat Midge is not infested by any parasites in 

 America. Dr. Fitch, who has paid particular at- 

 tention to the Natural History of this insect, states 



» See Dr. Fitch's N. Y. licport, III, p. 260, " Errata." 

 t Ibid. p. 5. 



as follows in the Journal of the N. Y. State Agr. 

 Soc. for March 1862 :— 



After the full investigation of the subject which I have 

 now made, I can state this fact with confidence — we kave 

 no pnrasifes in this country that destroy the wheat midge. 

 The insectso common on wheat, and which resembles the 

 European parasites of the midge so closely that, in the 

 New "York Natural History, it is described as being one 

 of those species, and in the Ohio Agrienltnral Reports it 

 is confidently set down as another of them, I find has no- 

 thing to do with the wheat midge, but is the parasite of 

 an ash gray bug [Nabisfera — a cannibal species] which 

 is common on grain and grass, laying its eggs in the 

 eggs of this bug, and thus destroying them. [See also 

 Fitch, N. Y. Rep. Ill, pp. 78 and 112, and P. E. II. p. 

 29.] 



The argument based upon the fact, that the 

 Wheat Midge disappears suddenly in certain j'ears, 

 is worth but little when we consider, that Thrips 

 is a cannibal insect, as I have shown, and not, as 

 had been previously imagined by all authors, a ve- 

 getable feeder; and that Thrips is known to occur 

 in very large numbers on ears of wheat infested by 

 the Wheat Midge. b. d. vr. 



THE TBEE-CEICKET AGAIN. 



( (Ecanthus nivetts). 



[From a letter from Edward Orton, of Yellow Springs, 0.] 



The Tree-cricket is very abundant in this vici- 

 nity, and its work can be seen in any fruit yard. It 

 deposits its eggs in the peach, the grape-vine, the 

 currant, the raspberry, and the common elder, to 

 my certain knowledge. In almost every case, the 

 branch dies beyond the point where the eggs are 

 inserted, and many persons on this account deem 

 the work of the insect injurious; but in most cases, 

 perhaps, it amounts to nothing more than a proper 

 shortening-in of the branch. I kept portions of 

 vines in which the eggs had been deposited, in a 

 drawer of my writing desk last summer, until 

 finally, on May 20th, the young insects made their 

 appearance. 



I shared in the popular prejudice last summer 

 to such an extent, that I destroyed thousands of the 

 (Ecanthus eggs; and either from that cause or 

 from some peculiarity of the season, their work is 

 quite scarce this spring on my own premises. I 

 shall be sorry enough for my crusade against them, 

 if it turns out that they are aphis-eaters. 



THEE CUT-WORMS. 



Mr. Riley of Chicago, has favored me with spe- 

 cimens of the species bred by him from his -'dark- 

 sided cut-worm;" and it does not belong, as I anti- 

 cipated, to the genus Iladena, but to Agrotis. It is 

 very remarkable, however, that the species which 

 has been, perhaps erroneously, named for me as 

 Iladena chenopodii, and which has the male an- 

 tennae perfectly unfeathered, (i. e. not "bipecti- 

 nate,") so closely resembles Mr. Riley's species in 

 its markings, that at first view they appear to be- 

 long to the same species. Yet, as it turns out, 

 they do not even belong to the same genus. 



B. D. \v. 



