45 



Its Life History. 



In the first warm days of spring the weevil issues from its 

 winter retreat under the bark of trees, among lichens and mosses 

 upon their branches, or under stones, grass, leaves, and rubbish 

 under them. Curtis and Schmidberger considered that the 

 females seldom use their wings, but that the males fly freely. 

 Dr. Henneguy, to whom a special mission was entrusted by the 

 French Minister of Agriculture to fully investigate the habits 

 of this insect in Brittany, states that both sexes fly easily, and 

 with equal frequency.* 



Either by flying, or by crawling, the female finds its way 

 to the blossom buds of apple and pear trees, and boring a hole 

 with its snout, places one egg within each bud, and carefully 

 closes up the aperture. This is the mode of oviposition 

 described by Curtis and other economic entomologists. M. Petit, 

 Departmental Professor of Agriculture in Morbihan, who has 

 studied this insect, states, however, that the female does not 

 perforate the flower-buds with its snout for egg deposition, but 

 with a stylet placed in the extreme end of its body, like a bee's 

 sting. f M. Petit remarks that by pressing the body of a female 

 weevil this stylet is protruded, and can be seen with a glass. 

 " It is hard to admit," he adds " that the insect should execute 

 a complicated manoauvre obliging it, after having pierced the 

 bud with its snout, to turn round and place the egg in an 

 invisible hole, smaller than the egg." 



A female lays from 15 to 20 eggs, but places one only in each 

 flower-bud. The process of laying one egg takes about three- 

 quarters of an hour. The egg is yellowish white, and oval. 

 Authorities agree that the period of egg laying in an individual 

 female may be continued for at least a fortnight. The eggs 

 are hatched in from five to nine days, according to the conditions 

 of the temperature. 



The larva, or maggot, is without feet, about 4 lines long 

 the third of an inch when full grown. It is wrinkled, and 

 white at first, gradually becoming of a yellowish hue, having a 

 brown head with two little brown spots on the first segment. 

 It lies in the bud in a curved form, and attacks the stamens 

 and pistils, but, it rarely touches the ovary. It soon causes 

 the petals to wither ; the flower-bud changes to a rusty hue, 

 and decays. 



Then the larva turns into a pupa, close upon a quarter of an 

 inch long, yellowish white, with its long rostrum, or snout, and 

 feet folded on the under side of its body. It remains in pupal 

 state for about 10 days, when it assumes weevil form and 

 bores a hole through the petals and emerges. 



* Rapport sur I'histoire naturelle de Vanthonome du pommier, et stir les moyens 

 proposes pour so, destruction, par le Dr. F. Henneguy. Bulletin du Miniitere de 

 1'Agriculture. France, dixieme annee So. 8, December 1891. 



f Guerre a. I'Anthonome. par P. Zipcy, Professeur a TEcole d'Agriculture du 

 Morbihan. Journal d'Agriculture Pratique, 1892. Tome I., No. 1. 7 Janvier. 



