WHEAT MIDGE. LOCUST BORER. 



227 



Fig. 68. 



804. The wheat midge, (Fig. 68, 

 magnified, the small mark at the 

 left shows the natural size,) is itself 

 exposed to the attacks of other 

 insects. An ichneumon fly deposits 

 its eggs in the larvae of the midge, 

 and the larvae hatched from them 

 prey upon the body on which they 

 find themselves. Many are thus 

 destroyed. If the stubble be col 

 lected and burned, innumerable grubs of the midge will 

 be consumed, and the good work of the ichneumon be 

 aided. 



805. The dor bug, as it is called, (Fig. 

 69,) is properly a beetle, and the parent of 

 those large white grubs which feed upon 

 the roots of grass and grain, and are so 

 frequently turned up by the spade or 

 plough. Domestic fowls devour great 

 numbers of them in the latter state, and 

 many of the beetles themselves are eaten 

 by skunks and weasels. 



806. The locust tree borer, (Fig. 70,) which ruins so 

 many of the finest trees, is the caterpillar of a moth, 



Fig. 70. 



which deposits its eggs in the deepest clefts of the bark. 

 They hatch into grubs which commence boring into the 

 very heart of the tree, piercing and mining it with their 

 burrows for three years before they make their appearance 



20* 



