78 MANGOLD. 



three-jointed club, and chestnut coloured, as are also the six short 

 legs ; wings ample. 



This beetle is well known on the Continent as seriously injurious 

 to Beet or Mangolds, but I am not aware that it has been brought for- 

 ward as similarly hurtful here, although John Curtis in a short notice* 

 of this A. linearis, mentions that "it is abundant in England, and no 

 doubt affects the crops of Mangel-Wurzel in this country." 



The first Continental notice of it appears to have been by Mons. 

 Bazin, who observed this insect in 1839 at Mesnil, St. Firmin, but I 

 believe that the observations by Prof. Allen Harker in 1891 of an 

 Atomaria, as being seriously injurious to the Mangold crops at the 

 Eoyal Agricultural College, Cirencester, are the first record of an insect 

 of this genus as a regular Mangold pest in England. 



On the 27th of February in the present year, Prof. Harker wrote 

 me : — " I think I mentioned to you that I found myriads of a small 

 Atomaria at our Mangolds last spring, when we lost about half the 

 crop." At the same time Prof. Harker forwarded me some extracts 

 from the publication mentioned below, of which he remarked: — "This 

 most accurately describes the appearance of our Mangolds, and I could 

 have collected hundreds of the Atomarias at each plant " ; and he also 

 remarked that he had not thought previously that they were such 

 serious pests. 



The extract is as follows : — " Injurious insects : Beet is attacked 

 during its growth by the larva of the ' Cockchafer,' called the ' White 

 grub,' and by a very small insect of the order Coleoptera, observed for 

 the first time in 1839, by Armand Bazin. This insect, to which the 

 name of Atomaria linearis has been given, belongs to the family of the 

 Clavicornes ; it is narrow, and hardly a millimetre and a half long ; its 

 colour variable, from rusty red to black-brown. This little insect 

 appears in May and June. Then it attacks the young Beets, gnaws 

 their tap-root {le pivot de leur racines), and eats their leaves. It is 

 during dry weather that the ravages are the most severe." f 



In most instances the plants sent me were, as far as I saw, dying 

 from injury to the root, but in the following note which accompanied 

 samples of injured plants sent me on the 26th of June, from Haughtou 

 Hall, Shifnal, Shropshire, by Mr. J. T. Brooke, it will be seen that 

 another of the forms of mischief caused by the A. linearis is described. 



Mr. Brooke observed : — " My Mangold crop is being decimated by 

 some pest which nibbles round the neck of the plant just at the 

 ground level. Hitherto I have been unable to detect any creature at, 

 or near, them." The soil was described as "light and dry," and 



* See ' Farm Insects,' pp. 395, 396. 



t From 'Cours d'Agricultuie Pratique: Les Plantes Fourrag^res,' par Gqstave 

 Henze. Paris: Hachette, 1861. Betterave, pp. 33, 34. 



