PACKARD] THE SPOTTED AND LEOPARD BLISTER-BEETLE. 731 



antennne are a little stouter than in C. fabricii, with the second joint 

 about one-third longer than the third." 



31. fabricii {cinerea ofFabricius) is of a uniform dull-ash color. It is 

 found usually east of the Mississii^pi, but also occurs in Kansas and 

 New Mexico, according to Dr. Le Conte. 



Remedies. — Hand-picking and brushiug the insects off the leaves in 

 the morning and evening is the best remedy. Harris says: "I have 

 repeatedly taken these insects in considerable quantities, by brushing 

 or shaking them from the potato-vines into a broad tin pan, from which 

 they were emptied into a covered i^ail contaiuiug a little water, which, 

 by wetting their wings, prevented their tlyiug out when the pail was un- 

 covered. The same method may be employed for taking the other kinds 

 of cantharides when they become troublesome and destructive from 

 their numbers; or they may be caught by gently sweeping the plants 

 they frequent with a deep muslin bag-net. They should be killed by 

 throwing them into scalding-water for one or twomiuutes, after which 

 they may be spread out on sheets of ])aper to dry, and may be made 

 profitable by selling them to the apothecaries for medical use." 



The Spotted Blister-Beetle, Epicauia maculafa (Say). (Plate LXYI, Ficr. 10.) 

 Feeding ou beets aud liable to devour potatoes ; a light-gray blister-beetle, spotted with 

 black ; destructive about Manitou, 'Colo. 



While none of the preceding species have yet been found to be injuri- 

 ous in Colorado or adjacent Territories, there are a number of species of 

 blister-beetles which inhabit the Eocky Mountain Plateau, and two have 

 beeu found to be iiijurious to field-crops. While at Manitou duiing the 

 middle of July I visited a large farm and found this spotted blister- 

 beetle in abundance on the leaves of the beet, and was told that on the 

 1st of July they swarmed upon the leaves so that " the plants were 

 gray with them." I also found this beetle at Golden, and it is evident 

 tQat it is destined to be more or less annoying to garden-vegetables and 

 l^robably potatoes. 



Desaiption of the beetle. — Pale yellowish-gray varying to a dark gray, being dark, 

 covered with a gray powder, cousistiug of minute short hairs when examined under a 

 hand-lens, and finely spotted with black on the wing-covers, the spots being nearly 

 obsolete on the head and prothorax as w'ell as the under side of the body. The legs 

 are of the same color as the rest of the body, but the toe-joints (tarsi) aud the tips of 

 the shanks (tibise) are blackish, as well as the antennae and feelers (palpi). It is usually 

 about half au inch long, but varies from a quarter to half an inch. It is rather slenderer 

 in form than any other of the species here named except the striped species {E. vittata). 

 It also occurs in Kansas aud Eastern New Mexico. This species has beeu named by 

 Dr. Horn. 



The Leopard Bi.ister-Beetle, Epicauta pardaVis Le Conte. (Plate LXYI, Fig. 11.) — 

 Injuring the potato-leaves in Southern Colorado, and doing more damage locally than 

 the striped Colorado iiotato-beetle ; a beautiful gray-spotted shining- black blister- 

 beetle. 



I received from Mr. T. Martin Trippe, a well-known naturalist, numerous 

 specimens of this blister-beetle, with the following account, dated How- 

 ardsville, Colo., July 25, 1875 : 



I send you herewith some specimens of a beetle that has lately destroyed the potato- 

 plant in this vicinity. They are worse than the Doriiphora deconJlneata in the 

 extent and rapidity of their devastations, and seem to have driveu the latter out of 

 the country. Befwe the appearance of this new potato-bug the latter were quite nu- 

 merous, and had already begun to injure the crops somewhat; but these new-comers 

 stripped the viues in a week, and a few days after they appeared in numbers the 

 Dorijphoras were nowhere to be seen. No one seems to know of or to have seen them 

 before. Before immersion in alcohol they were spotted with white, the spots being 

 quite small — size of a pin-point ; the head unspotted. They feed ou wild Solanacea;. 



