199 



CHAPTEK YI. 



INJURIOUS FOREST INSECTS (SPECIAL ACCOUNT 

 OF COLEOPTERA).* 



THE greatest number and the most harmful species of 

 injurious forest insects belong to the orders Coleoptera and 

 Lcpidoptera. Next in importance to these come the members 

 of the orders Hymenoptera and Orthoptera. The orders Dip- 

 tera and Hemiptera, except for the few useful families already 

 mentioned, include only species which are moderately or 

 slightly injurious, and the Neuroptera in Central Europe 

 include no injurious species, although in the south of Europe 

 and in India and other hot countries, the family of Termites, 

 or white ants, belonging to this order, is probably more 

 destructive to vegetable substances, though chiefly when these 

 are no longer living, than any other insect-family. 



In the following pages the more destructive families of 

 insects will be enumerated and described. The life-history 

 of the most important species, and their relations to forest 

 trees, and the best known ways of meeting their attacks, will 

 also be dealt with, but many less important species which 

 occur in Dr. Hess's book have been omitted. Hess has also 

 separated the injurious forest insects damaging conifers, from 

 those which damage broad-leaved trees. Owing to the smaller 

 number of insects here dealt with, this distinction has been 

 abandoned. 



FAMILY I. SCARABAEIDAE. 

 Description of Family. 



Imagos generally of considerable size and robust build. 

 Antennae short, elbowed, 10- or 11-jointed, the first joint 

 elongate, the last 3 or more joints produced inwards into 



* For a complete systematic description of British beetles, vide Fowler, " The 

 Coleoptera of the British Isles," 5 vols., London, 18861891. 



