Insect Ravages in Woodlands. 



165 



7. ruvitic"* mailo in Fallen Timber by the 

 I.nrvii- of Insects, tending to rapidly 



luislru it 



may still be good for car- 

 pentry, but improper for 

 coopers' use ; if the bur- 

 rows are laiye, they tend 

 to admit m: isture, and to 

 become great open cavi- 

 tie>, and in certain other 

 he wood is so eaten 

 that it becomes nothing 

 but a shell perhaps sound 

 and without the least a\>- 

 pearance of injury ext--r- 

 nally, but wholly eaten 

 out into caverns within. 



(itil. These wood-eating 

 insects an- especially com- 

 mon in decaying wood, 

 and where they an- strict- 

 ly limited to this, they can 

 scarcely he considered as 

 of great injury, and in 

 some cases they may be 

 even beneficial, in hasten- 

 ing its decay. 



(5(i'J. There are other 

 classes of insects found 

 upon wood and leaves, and 

 even in burrows in the 

 wood and bark, that are 

 predatory in their habits, 

 pursuing other insects and 

 destroying them, cither in 

 the perfect state, or as lar- 

 va-, or by 

 their eggs. 



662^. These carnivorous insects arc the surest agency for counter- 

 acting the inordinate increase of the injurious kinds, and when the 

 latter multiply to undue extent, the abundance of food thus offered 

 leads to their increase also, until the balance of nature is again re- 



HiHHHHHiMuiM^^H^^HHR^Ht'fEMiH^^HMi 



feeding upon 88. Wood that has been thoroughly ruined by the 

 Larvae of the Ccrambi/x lieros. 



