36 INSECT PESTS 



however, take the crops more or less in their order. 

 With Clover we find our first uninvited guest in the 

 shape of a weevil. Throughout the whole of our study of 

 pests we shall find that these small beetles are with us, both 

 in and out of doors, in some form or other even to the 

 last. In fact, weevils, to which I shall have to recur 

 so many times, are not to be put off in any way. Their 

 enterprise and persistence is an excellent example to 

 the grower and the farmer alike. 



The Clover Weevils, of which there are more than 

 one species, attack all kinds of leguminous crops, the 

 insect shown, sometimes called the Striped Bean and 

 Pea Weevil {Sitones lineatus) being the commonest. 

 It measures about \ inch in length, and is greenish-grey 

 in colour, the thorax being often striped with fight and 

 dark shades. Both beetles and their maggots are harm- 

 ful, the latter feeding on the roots of the plants. The 

 eggs are laid in early spring close to the roots of the 

 crop by the adult females which have been hibernating 

 throughout the winter months in litter around corn and 

 haystacks and other odd nooks and corners. These 

 produce small white maggots, root-feeders throughout 

 May and June, eventually becoming the summer brood 

 of weevils. These insects may be effectually checked by 

 a rigorous and constant collection of fitter and fikely 

 wild herbage in the shape of vetches and other weeds. 



Clover is also subject to attack from Eelworms, a 

 minute animal, allied to the intestinal worms, known as 

 Tylenchus devastatrix, which feeds within the tissues of 

 the plant, and is the cause of one of the forms of clover 

 sickness, and it passes to and from several crops. {See 

 remarks on field strawberries in Chapter IV,) Eelworms 

 also attack oats, onions, daffodils, hyacinths and other 

 garden plants. Where the groimd is infested with them 

 it should be gas-limed. 



Grass Land, as we might suppose, is at times subject 

 to severe attacks from insects, principally moths and 



