4 68 



MY GARDEN. 



I 



(fig. 1035) live in countless multitudes upon the cambium under the 

 outer bark. 



The Anthonomus pomorum (fig. 1036) is another beetle 

 which has a great influence upon the produce of the 

 apple-trees. Its larvae devour the pistils, stamens, and 

 ovaries of the flowers in the month of May, and there FIG. 1036. 



nomus pomorum. 



are very few gardens where this pest is not found. 



I have smelt the Musk Beetle (Aronia moschata), the fragrant scent 

 of which has been likened to a mixture of musk and attar of roses ; 

 but I have never seen a specimen in my garden. Some years ago, 

 in the course of a single afternoon, I saw hundreds of musk beetles 

 sunning themselves on the trunks of the willows growing on the 

 side of the old Croydon canal, upon the site of which the railroad 

 now runs. 



My garden has been much infested with Wire-worms, the larvae of 

 various species of the Elateridae. They especially frequent grass 

 meadows, and as my garden was originally a grass meadow, I have been 

 proportionally tormented by them. The larvae are supposed to live 

 five years underground before they assume the beetle form, and during 



the whole of that time they 

 devour the roots of plants. 

 Rooks are their great natural 

 destroyers. I have found 

 upwards of a hundred of 

 these beetles in the crop of 

 a rook shot in the early 

 morning, before five o'clock. 

 The gardener may trap them 

 by placing slices of potato 



FIG. 1037. Wire-worm. 



in the ground, round which they will congregate, and from which they 

 may be taken and destroyed. Wire-worms are some of the very worst 

 pests which the gardener has to extirpate. There are many species, 

 but all are alike in the injury which they inflict upon the gardener. 

 This extremely 'destructive creature is allied in its general charac- 



