354 TEXT- BOOK OF ZOOLOGY 



whilst its strong, unpleasant smell probably renders it unpalatable to 

 all insect-eating animals. For the preparation of the well-known blister- 

 ing plaster (name of family) the beetles are collected, dried, and ground 

 to powder. 



Family 8 : Weevils (Curculionidae). 



The Apple-Blossom Weevil (Antlwnomus pomorum}. 



(Length about J inch.) 



If an apple blossom looking brown and shrivelled, as if scorched, in 

 fact, be opened, a small insect larva will be found inside which lives on 

 the stamens and pistils of the flower. This larva is eyeless and white, 

 living in the dark (see cockchafer), and also limbless, and hence termed 

 a maggot, since it is not obliged to journey from one place to another 

 (see bee). About the middle of May the larva enters into the pupa 

 stage, and about eight days later a small beetle, the apple-blossom 

 weevil, emerges from the shrivelled blossom. Now, how has the maggot 

 got into the flower? The beetle has simply deposited an egg in the 

 bud. This has been effected, not by means of an ovipositor, as in the 

 ichneumon flies and their allies (which see), but by the help of the head, 

 which in this insect is prolonged into a long rostrum or proboscis (as in a 

 shrew-mouse), at the end of which is placed the small mouth with its 

 masticatory organs. By means of the relatively strong mandibles (the 

 other mouth parts are very small) the beetle gnaws a narrow deep 

 hole in the bud. It then lays an egg in the opening of the passage, 

 and pushes it with the proboscis onward to the stamens. It might be 

 supposed that in this operation the antennae get in the way. These, 

 however, are bent back, their lower portion being laid in a furrow 

 of the proboscis when the latter is pushed into the bud. The food of 

 the beetle consists of the leaves of trees. As the eggs are not deposited 

 until the following spring, it is compelled to hibernate. It then leaves 

 its crannies and ascends the trunks of the apple-trees. The careful 

 fruit-grower, however, stops the progress of the destructive creature by 

 rings of sticky gum before it can do any damage. On account of its bark- 

 like colour (blackish-brown with grayish hairs and a white band on each 

 wing-cover), the beetle cannot easily be recognised when creeping up a 

 tree-trunk, nor is it easy to discover it on the ground, to which it allows 

 itself to drop on the approach of an enemy (see skipjack). Its hard 

 chitinous covering is a further by no means unimportant protection to 

 the insect. (What do you frequently observe when you are putting pins 



