204 



HOUSEHOLD INSECTS 



westward through Ohio, Indiana, Michigan, Wisconsin, 

 Illinois, and Kansas. 



The nature of the pest. In this country this pest is 

 usually known as the " buffalo bug " or '* buffalo moth " (Fig. 

 58). These names are both misnomers because the pest is 

 not a bug, nor is it a moth. On the contrary, the adult 

 insect is a small beetle about three-sixteenths of an inch 

 long with a general background of black, spotted and 

 speckled with white, and with a red line down the mid- 

 dle of its back. Near each end 



FIG. 58. The "buffalo bug 

 (carpet beetle). (X 9.) 



there are side projections of red. 

 Thus the beetle is rather hand- 

 some in its markings of black, 

 red, and white. 



Most housewives are, however, 

 not acquainted with the adult 

 beetle, but rather with the 

 active, brown, hairy larva. It 

 is not the full-grown beetle that 

 inflicts the injury to carpets, 

 woolens, and furs, but, like the clothes moth, it is the 

 larva that does the mischief. The beetles feed upon 

 the pollen of flowers and are often found out-of-doors 

 in the spring on spirea, wild cherry, and, later, on 

 milfoil and other plants. When the beetles develop in 

 the house they fly to the window panes in an effort to 

 escape into the open air. Unfortunately, lady-birds (Fig. 

 59) are often found in the same situations and are many 

 times mistaken for the carpet beetles and killed. The 

 adult carpet beetles, when disturbed, fold up their legs 

 and antennae, feigning death and playing " 'possum." 



