No. 10. 



Mammoth Corn, 



305 



There are at least three other kinds of in- 

 sects injurious to wheat in this country; but 

 they are not likely to be mistaken for either 

 of the foregoing-, if ordinary care is taken 

 in examining them. One is the wheat-moth, 

 called in the Southern States the " flying 

 weevil," and at the West the " white wee- 

 vil." It is found both in the fields and in 

 granaries and mills. The young are very 

 small whitish wormlike caterpillars, which 

 live singly within the grains, and devour 

 the substance, leaving the hull whole and 

 untouched, till they are about to come forth. 

 The second is a somewhat larger caterpillar, 

 found only in granaries and in stored grain. 

 It fastens several grains together, and lives 

 in these masses of clustered grains, upon 

 the substance of tlie wheat ; and it turns to 

 a small moth or miller. The third is the 

 " black-weevil of the Southern States, and 

 is rarely found here. It is, when young, a 

 email whitish grub, which lives within the 

 grains of wheat, and turns to a little brown 

 or blackish beetle. These three kinds are 

 described in my work, pages 70, 363 and 

 365. 



In the "Essays .on the Grain Worm, No. 

 2," published in the Maine Farmer, Mr. L. 

 Norcross, of Dixfield, states that some of the 

 worms are one-fourth of an inch in length. 

 He adds, that " two years ago I harvested 

 my grain very damp, and it was heated in 

 the mow. I threshed two bushels, and win- 

 nowed it in the wind ; and after it had lain 

 in the pile an hour, the top of the pile was 

 alive with worms or caterpillars, about three- 

 eighths of an inch in length, with a row of 

 bristles sticking up along their backs and 

 from their sides." 



The orange coloured maggots of the wheat 

 fly are found in Dixmont, Maine, and proba- 

 bly in many other parts of the State ; but 

 the wheat caterpillars are also found there, 

 and five of them have been sent to me from 

 Dixmont, where they are said to have been 

 taken from the wheat, the grains of which 

 had been much eaten by them. These ca- 

 terpillars were from half an inch to five- 

 eighths of an inch in length. They were 

 of a light brown colour, with three longitu- 

 dinal whitish lines on the back, and a broad 

 white stripe on each side, just above the 

 legs. The latter were sixteen in number, 

 six before, two behind, and eight under the 

 intermediate part of the body. They were 

 in a languishing condition, and all perished 

 without completing their transformations. 

 Had they lived, they would have turned 

 first to brownish chrysalides, and then to 

 some kind of winged moths or millers. If 

 any of these insects remain, it is probable 

 they have already taken the chrysalis form, 



or are preparing for it, either by burrowing 

 in the ground like canker-worms when they 

 leave the trees, or by seeking a place of con- 

 cealment above ground. 



It will give me much pleasure to be put 

 in communication with any persons who can 

 provide me with a considerable number of 

 these wheat worms with legs, or wheat ca- 

 terpillars, or with the same after they have 

 taken the chrysalis form. Gentlemen who 

 are able and willing thus to favour me, are 

 requested to make known their intentions by 

 a letter addressed to me by mail. 



Will you be pleased, sir, to bring this 

 subject before the readers of your useful 

 paper, in such a way as will best promote 

 the object of my inquiries ; by so doing you 

 will greatly oblige. 



Yours respectfully, 



Thaddetjs William Harris. 



Cambridge, Mass , November, 1846. 



Afammoth Corn. 



Mr. Editor, — As corn is an article of the 

 most extensive consumption amongst us — 

 without which we could not well live ; and 

 for the special benefit of those of your read- 

 ers, who doubt the advantage of a careful 

 selection of their seed, I would beg leave to 

 state a fact or two, and refer them to the 

 proof at hand. From the specimens shown 

 me, in its growing state, as well as when 

 gathered, I must say, emphatically, it yields 

 more for the industrious and energetic plant- 

 er, than any grain of the kind I have seen 

 or even dreamed of. On an exhausted 

 plantation, near Monticello, on the red hills 

 of Little River, in old worn-out Fairfield, 

 Mr. J. R. D. — I trust he will excuse this 

 liberty, in an old grey-headed man, — has 

 succeeded this year in making corn, mea- 

 suring from twelve to thirteen inches in cir- 

 cumference, and from twelve to fourteen 

 inches in^ length, having forty to forty-eight 

 rows of grains on the ear ! This, however, 

 is a yield of but one ear to the stalk — the 

 ears from stalks bearing five or six ears or 

 more, are, of course, smaller; though as 

 many as three, generally, of the ears from 

 those stalks, will each measure, when shell- 

 ed, nearly twice as much as the largest ear 

 of the common corn. It is mostly of the 

 white gourd-seed corn. The question may 

 naturally arise in the mindsof many — whence 

 did Mr. D. get this seed ] I answer, that he 

 made it by a careful and judicious selection 

 from a variety of seed — the one is, I learn, 

 remarkable only for a grain an inch deep, or 

 a cob the size of your finger, — another, for 

 its thickness of cob, but provokingly short — 

 and the other for its length of cob, provok- 



