128 ENTOMOLOGICAL NEWS. [April, 



perfect must it be of the smaller species of Coleoptera, Hymenoptera, 

 Diptera, etc., many of which are of almost microscopic dimensions. Many 

 insects are so local and so closely connected with plants which disappear 

 before civilization that the same fate of extermination which has fallen 

 on so many of the larger animals during the last century cannot but fall 

 heavily upon these also. It is not too much to say that it is highly pro- 

 bable that a large proportion of the insects at present existing in the 

 world will become extinct before their existence is even known to scientific 

 men. — W. F. Kirby in "Knowledge." 



Food-plants of the Potato Stalk-weevil, Trichobasis trinotata 

 Say. — This insect has for many years been known as affecting the stem 

 of the potatoes, but of latg is either changing its larval habits somewhati 

 or else entomologists are becoming more apt in their investigations; pos- 

 sibly both. A recent Bulletin from the Iowa Experiment Station gives, 

 besides the potato, several species of " Ground Celery" and the " Horse 

 Nettle," while lately one of my correspondents near Cincinnati, Ohio, is 

 complaining bitterly of injuries to his egg plants " during the last three 

 years." Some sections of these affected plants of last year sent me Feb- 

 ruary ist contained adults of this weevil. It will now be in order to watch 

 the tomato. The list of food-plants of the larvae, as now understood, 

 will stand as follows : 



Solanum tuberosum, Miss. Margaretta H. Morris, Harris Ins Inj. Veg.^ 

 1841, p. 72; Flint ed. pp. 81-82. 



Solanum carolinense, Physalis philadelphica, P. virginiana var. atn- 

 bigua, P. lanceolata, F. A. Sirrine, Bull. 19, Iowa Agri. Exp. Station, 

 November, 1892 (issued February, 1893), pp. 589-94. 



Solatium melongena, F. M. Webster. 



Prof. C. P. Gillette (Bull. 12, Iowa Agri. Exp. Station, p. 547) stated, 

 in 189 1, that he had observed the adults in Winter in two species of Phy- 

 salis, but does not give the species. — F. M. Webster, Wooster, Ohio. 



Identification of Insects (^Images) for Subscribers. 



Specimens will be named under the following conditions : 1st, The number of speci- 

 mens to be unlimited for each sending; 2d, The sender to pay all expenses of transporta- 

 tion and the insects to become the property of the American Entomological Society ; 

 3d, Each specimen must have a number attached so that the identification may be an- 

 nounced accordingly. Exotic species named only by special arrangement with the Editor, 

 who should be consulted before specimens are sent. Send a 2 cent stamp with all insects 

 for return of names. Before sending insects for identification, read page 41, Vol. III. 

 Address all packages to Entomological News, Academy Natural Sciences, Logan 

 Square, Philadelphia, Pa. 



Pliny, to whom the origin of the sweet, viscid fluid (honey-dew) secreted 

 by the Aphides was unknown, says, " it is either a certaine sweat of the 

 skie, or some unctuous gellie proceeding from the starres, or rather a 

 liquid purged from the aire when it purifyeth itself." 



