REPORT ON FORESTS. 223 



doing the main work at the beginning and opening the^way for 

 decay and the species that further it. Species of all sizes will 

 bore little holes, most of which blacken or discolor, and lessen 

 the value of the boards into which the trunk may be cut. Then 

 the larger galleries prevent its use for that purpose altogether. 

 After the larger borers have made a good start, ants come in 

 and occupy their galleries, extending and connecting them for 

 their own guests and other .messmates, which, though they do 

 not directly feed upon the wood, yet open up new points for 

 decay. Termites, or so-called white ants, come along and work 

 at the surface or underground, and these are destructive when 

 once started. They are typical wood-feeders, and their colonies 

 contain countless numbers, reducing a tree to a mass of galleries 

 in an astonishingly short time. When once these insects have 

 made a fair start in a trunk, its value as timber is gone. In 

 fact, it may be said that from the time life has ceased, standing 

 timber deteriorates continually and ever more rapidly, primarily 

 as the result of insect-attack. 



If a load of cord-wood be cut in winter and piled, it makes an 

 excellent collecting-ground the year following. From the time 

 that spring is fairly open, beetles, flies, many Hymenoptera and 

 some visitors of other orders flit about it, some seeking food or 

 shelter merely, others a suitable point for breeding. In mid- 

 June it will be a busy scene during the warm sunny hours, and 

 all seasons new forms .keep coming. During the latter part of 

 the winter following it will be noted that much of the bark on 

 the sticks comes off easily, and in the following spring it can be 

 lifted off readily from the majority of them. Examination will 

 show that the tissue between bark and wood has been com- 

 pletely eaten out by a series of larvae which are called by the 

 woodmen in some localities "bark-slippers." They are round 

 and flat-headed borers, though the former predominate, and are 

 mostly members of the genus Phymatodes^ all of whose species 

 have similar habits. Beneath this loose bark we find secondary 

 species : members of the order Thysamira, spring-tails mostly, 

 that occur wherever there is moist, decaying or fermenting veg- 

 etation of any kind. With these, and probably preying upon 

 them, are the little pseudo-scorpions, or Chelifera, which may 

 be found in all stages in early summer. Centipedes and milli- 



