CLOVER-LEAF MIDGE. 383 



done by the mature beetle. The weevils are voracious eaters, 

 consuming every part of the plant above the earth, and like most 

 weevils feeding by night and hiding by day in crevices in the 

 earth or among the stems of the plants. Like the larvae they 

 are very timid, and fall at the slightest jar of the plants. It 

 feeds on all kinds of clover, red, white, and alsike. The beetles 

 in July and August often do very serious damage, completing 

 the work of destruction so well begun by the larvae at an earlier 

 date. 



Dr. Riley expresses an opinion, possibly born of hope, that this 

 insect will not spread. I have already shown how it may easily 

 be carried far west, and as we already have seen, it surely is 

 spreading quite rapidly, there is grave reason to fear its general 

 spread in the Northern United States. 



As we can not well use Paris green, it is probable that no bet- 

 ter thing can be done than to plow under the clover in fields at- 

 tacked in May, at which time the insects will be in the larva 

 state, and so probably killed by this treatment. If we wait to 

 cut for hay many of the insects would have already pupated, and 

 so would come forth to new mischief the next year. 



It is probable that the various predaceous insects will aid to 

 diminish the numbers of this pest, and in time the parasitic in- 

 sects here as well as in Europe will help to hold it in oheck. 



Cecidomyia trifolii, Leow, Clover-leaf Midge. 



Order Diptera. Family Cecidomyidae. 



Loew Verhandl. Zool. Bot., Gesell., XX., 14, p. 142, 1874. 



Comstock Ann. Rept. Comm. Ag., 1879, pp. 197-199, HI. 



Lintner Rept. N. Y. Ag. Soc. 1882, p. 203, El. 



Saunders Rept. Ontario En. Soc., Vol, XII., p. 45, 1881, HI. 

 This insect is so nearly like the far more destructive clover 

 leaf midge, yet to be described, that only an expert could 

 distinguish them the one from the other. This species has only 

 been discovered about Washington, and unless it becomes more 

 widely distributed, or worse still, learns the habit of its near 



