32 ANIMAL BIOLOGY 



bug which sucks the juices of corn, wheat and other grains. 

 Kellogg in describing the damage done by this bug in the 

 Mississippi valley states that he has "seen great corn 

 fields in this valley ruined in less than a week, the little 

 black and white bugs massing in such numbers on the 

 growing corn that the stalk and bases of the leaves were 

 wholly concealed by the covering of bugs." The United 

 States Entomologist estimated that the annual losses 

 caused by the chinch bug amount to $20,000,000 a year. 

 While numerous species of bugs are destructive to vege- 

 tation there are many which prey upon other insects. 

 Among these are the " assassin bugs," and the celebrated 

 "kissing bug" which occasionally inflicts very painful 

 bites upon human beings. The cone nose, or "big 

 bedbug" occasionally attacks man also, but a more fa- 

 miliar and widespread pest is the ordinary bedbug of 

 human dwellings. While these disagreeable insects 

 possess but very small functionless rudiments of wings 

 they can run with remarkable quickness. During the 

 day they lie concealed in cracks and crevices, but at night 

 they scurry about in search of their sleeping human vic- 

 tims at whose expense they gorge their bodies with blood. 

 They breed with remarkable rapidity, and wherever 

 they make their appearance it is therefore advisable to 

 wage war upon them with the greatest vigor. For this 

 purpose a saturated solution of corrosive sublimate in 

 alcohol applied to the crevices where they lie concealed 

 is an efficient remedy, although one which should be used 

 with care as it is very poisonous. Besides being disagreea- 

 ble on account of their bites and offensive odor, bedbugs 

 are the means of transmitting certain diseases from one 

 person to another. A disease common in India, and re- 

 lapsing fever which sometimes occurs in the United States 

 are transmitted by these insects. 



