314 CONNECTICUT GEOL. AND NAT. HIST. SURVEY. [Bull. 



few small bees, the wasps including flower-fertilizing species and 

 parasitic species of the families Ichneumonidae, Braconidse, and 

 Scoliidse. 



" The value of a bird as an insect destroyer depends upon the 

 Aralue of the insects it consumes. Each insect eaten by birds must 

 of necessity be injurious, beneficial, or neutral in its effect on 

 crops, though it is not always easy to classify it properly. While 

 present information is sufficient to fix the status of some with 

 sufficient accuracy for all practical purposes, in the case of others 

 more light is needed. The smaller dung-feeding scarabaeid 

 beetles appear to have little or no effect upon agriculture. The 

 great majority of ants have habits which are apparently of little 

 interest to the agriculturist; and although some (of the genus 

 Lasius), and perhaps others, possess certain injurious traits, 

 while a few may have traits that are beneficial, yet the effects in 

 any event are of minor importance ; so that ants as a whole may 

 safely be classed as neutral. Spiders, which for purposes of 

 convenience are here classed with insects, are carnivorous, but 

 their prey seems to include about as many beneficial insects as 

 pests. The damage done by weevils, grasshoppers, and smooth 

 caterpillars is notorious. Cutworms and army worms often do 

 an hnmense amount of harm, and grasshoppers frequently occur 

 in such voracious hosts that they sweep away every vestige of 

 green vegetation before them. On the other hand, carnivorous 

 ground beetles (Carabidae) kill multitudes of insect pests, and 

 certain parasitic wasp-like hymenopterous insects of the families 

 Braconidse, Chalcididae, and Ichneumonidae destroy great num- 

 bers of caterpillars. One of these parasitic insects will deposit 

 in the back of a caterpillar from 20 to 2,000 eggs, which soon 

 hatch into grub-like larvae that feed upon the fatty tissues and 

 exhaust the caterpillar so that it is not able to transform into a 

 perfect insect." 



" On one of the Maryland farms visited in 1896, Tree Spar- 

 rows, Fox Sparrows, White-throated Sparrows, Song Sparrows, 

 and Juncos fairly swarmed during the month of December in 

 the briers of the ditches between the cornfields. They came into 

 the open fields to feed on weed seed, and were most active where 

 the smartweed formed a tangle on low ground. Later in the 

 season the place was carefully examined. In a cornfield near a 



