458 BULLETIN 388 



in crevices resulting from injury. His figures of the various stages of the 

 insect are the first ever published. Paykull (1792) records the beetle as 

 injuring Salix species, and also refers to Linnets statement that dock 

 (Rumex lapathi) is one of its host plants. Bechstein and Scharfenberg 

 (1804) quote from Curtis's work, and also refer to the injuriousness of 

 the beetle in Germany. 



The insect is recorded in all the early systematic works dealing with the 

 snout beetles (Rhynchophora) , but no biological data are added. Ratze- 

 burg (1839) records alder as one of its host plants, stating that in Silesia 

 the beetle is known as the alder destroyer (Erlenwiirger). Nordlinger 

 (1856) records the insect as doing serious damage to young birches from 

 five to eight feet high, their tops breaking off after having been seriously 

 injured by the numerous larval galleries. 



Westwood (1863) describes a serious outbreak of the beetle in ornamental 

 willows in Essex County, England. Ratzeburg (1868) gives a much more 

 extended account of the beetle and its injuriousness throughout the forests 

 of Germany. His account of its life history is incomplete, though he gives 

 many details as to its food plants and habits. Altum (1881) records the 

 beetle as doing serious injury to stands of white and of black alder in 

 various parts of Germany, as well as attacking several species of willows. 

 He does not clear up any of the various disputed points not well under- 

 stood regarding the habits and life history of the insect. Judeich and 

 Nitsche (1889), though they discuss the insect in some detail and list all 

 its known food plants, leave the question of its biology in the same 

 condition as they found it. 



The beetle is discussed more or less in detail also in many recent Euro- 

 pean works on forest and shade tree insects, but no attempt has been made 

 to clear up the many obscure points in its bionomics. Scheidter (1913) 

 gives an extended account of its life history in various parts of Germany, 

 and seems to have added considerable new biological data, much of it 

 differing widely from that found in America. 



In America 



This European insect was first recorded in America by Juelich (1887), 

 who collected a single beetle at Williamsbridge, New York City, in 1882. 

 In 1887 he found willows infested by the insect at West Bergen, New 

 Jersey. In the previous year Ottomar Dietz had collected a single speci- 

 men on Staten Island, so that at this early date the insect was established 

 in the extreme southeastern part of New York and the northeastern 

 corner of New Jersey. Smith (1891) reported its spread in New Jersey 

 and the destruction by it of nearly all the clumps of willows, as well as 

 many fancy ornamental trees, at Newark and Arlington. 



