﻿OF THE STATE ENTOMOLOGIST. 91 



protecting pellicle is worked off before issuing from the ground, the 

 animal loses all power of further forcing its way out. The instinctive 

 tendency to push upwards is also remarkable. In glass tubes, in which 

 I have had the eggs hatching in order to watch the young, these last 

 would always turn their heads and push toward the bottom whenever 

 the tubes were turned mouth downward; while in tin boxes where 

 the eggs were placed at different depths in the ground, the young 

 never descended, even when they were unable to ascend on account 

 of the compactness of the soil above. • 



ADDITIONAL NATURAL ENEMIES. 



The enemies of the Rocky Mountain Locust may be divided into 

 those which destroy the eggs and those which attack and destroy the 

 active insects. 



Animals which destroy the eggs. — In addition to the Black-bird 

 and Prairie Chicken, previously mentioned as feeding on the eggs, 

 Mr. Geo. F. Gamner, of Lawrence, Kans., has found the Lapland Long- 

 spur {Pleciro'phanes lappoiiicus)^ the Horned Lark {^Eromophila 

 ■cornuta) and the Quail doing the same good work, feeding especially 

 on such eggs as are exposed by freezing and thawing. Mr. J. W. Rob- 

 son, of Cheever, Kans., has found the Skunk and Striped Squirrel 

 destroying large numbers of the eggs, and the Greeley (Col.) Sun 

 reports five acres of land dug all over by the former animal in search 

 •of them. The Silky Mite ( Tromhidium sericium), the habits of which 

 were related in my 7th Report, did much good in destroying the eggs 

 in the more northern States. In parts of Minnesota it reduced them 

 to a powder over extensive areas, and as the power of these minute 

 scarlet bodies for good as egg-destroyers has been questioned, I give 

 the following reports, which tell their own story : 



Last evening-, when we reached Worthnio^ton from Lake Shetek, there was quite 

 an excitement in Worth ing ton, owing to the fact that the citizens were g^enerally con- 

 vinced that a red parasite was destroying tiie grassliopper eggi:'. I examined the mat- 

 ter carefully myself, and became convinced that the destruction of the egg-s in that 

 immediate vicinity was well assured ; bat I determined not to write you and excite any 

 hope until a further and more complete examination could be had. AVe therefore fur- 

 nished our Bohemian friends with a bottle of the eggs and thei?- pesis, and the commis- 

 sion left in high spirits. " We postponed further investigation until this morning, when 

 I left and prosecuted the examination with vigor. The farmers in the vicinity knew 

 nothing of the.«e signs of deliverance until the visitors from Worthington reached 

 them, and I feel safe in saying to you that in a circle of ten miles from Worthington 

 there will scarcely be an egg left i)y to-morrow night. I send you a bottle herewith 

 containing the cones and the parasites. We could scarcely find a cone or sack, except 

 as they were indicated by the parasite on the surface ; and each cone, which was not 

 entirely destroyed, had from live to fifty of the red laborers at work upon the eggs. 

 We found scores of cells with no eggs left, except the shells. 



* * * * * * * ** * * 



I stopped for fifteen minutes oue-and-a-half miles west of Wilder, where Section 

 Foreman Smith took me to that portion of his farm where eggs were deposited. We 

 could find none by general digging, but wherever we toun ), as we frequently did, the 

 red parasite on the surface, we found the cone beneath, with the parasite at work con- 



