300 INSECTS AFFECTING MAN AND HOUSEHOLD 



way, similar to other ants. Probably egg-laying goes on more or 

 less continuously throughout the warm weather. This pest may 

 become a great nuisance through infesting food materials, espe- 

 cially sweets. 



Control. Various methods have been adopted to free a house 

 of this troublesome insect. The writer has destroyed them in a 

 house from which the owners were absent by fumigation with 

 hydrocyanic acid gas. They may be trapped by means of a piece 

 of sponge soaked in sweetened water, these sponges being picked 

 up when full of ants and dropped in boiling water. Scraps of 

 bone or meat may be used in the same way and burned. 



A poison solution may be made as follows : Dissolve 5 pounds 

 sugar in 1 J/2 pints of warm water. Add % ounce of sodium arse- 

 nite, dissolved in a little hot water. Sponges 

 may be moistened with this solution and placed 

 in cans with holes punched in the lids. The 

 position of these baits should be occasionally 

 changed. This poison is slow in acting. The 

 ants eat it and carry it to the nests, where it is 

 used to feed their young. It is to be noted that 

 this bait would be poisonous to human beings. 

 Pantry shelves painted with a saturated 

 solution of alum appear to defy these insects. 

 Refrigerators, tables, or cabinets may be insu- 

 FIG. 309. The little lated by placing the legs in dishes and pans of 

 eSarged h use antf much water. As with other ants, for complete relief 

 it is necessary to destroy the egg-producing 

 queens, and if a nest of this species can be found relief can be 

 immediately obtained by squirting kerosene, gasoline, or carbon 

 bisulfid into the nest with an oil can or with a syringe. 



"Silver Fish" or "Fish Moth." This is the quick-moving, 

 delicate, wingless, silver-gray insect (Lepisma saccharina Linn.), 

 often observed on opening a bureau drawer or in an unused room. 

 When touched it sheds glistening gray scales. It is one-half inch 

 long, the head bearing two long feelers or antennae. At the pos- 

 terior end of the insect are three long filaments. 



Injury. The "silver fish/' which represents a very low order 

 of insects, lives in dark places among undisturbed books or stored 

 linen or silk or paper, or where any stored substance may be 

 obtained for food. It has been known to completely ruin silk 

 dresses put away for a long period. (See Fig 11, page 15.) 



