Wire-Worm. 117 



(^'taphylinidte). This insect was observed to infest the wheat, 

 in its earliest stage of growth, after vegetation had commenced; 

 eating into the young plant about an inch below the surface, and 

 devouring the central part ; and thus, vegetation being stopped, 

 the plant dies. Out of fifty acres sown with this grain in 1802, ten 

 had been destroyed by the grub in question so early as Octo- 

 ber. This larva is quite unlike that of the wire-worm ; being 

 depressed, and more of a fleshy consistence, with the abdomen 

 terminated by two long, slender, articulated, hairy filaments. In 

 its habits, however, it bears a much nearer resemblance to that 

 insect; although, in a popular work on insects [Ins. Transf., 

 p. 231.), it is doubted whether the injury in question were really 

 caused by the larvae observed by Mr. Walford. There can, 

 however, be no doubt that such was the fact, as the larvae of 

 many of the AStaphylinidae, as well as of the Carabidae (including 

 that of the Zabrus gibbus, respecting which considerable di- 

 versity of opinion has existed, as to whether it was herbivorous 

 or insectivorous), are known to feed upon vegetables, not only 

 in a putrid, but also in a growing, state. 



In like manner, the larvae of two species of Tipulidae, gene- 

 rally confounded together under the name of the grub, and 

 which are often very prejudicial in pasture lands, by devouring 

 the roots of the grass, and so causing it to die oiF, have been 

 occasionally described as the wire-worm ; probably from their 

 cylindrical form, although the consistence of their bodies is much 

 slighter than that of the latter : and, still more recently, an 

 account has been published in the daily newspapers, of the in- 

 juries caused by a larva upon turnips, and of a very successful 

 attempt to destroy them, in which the insect was spoken of as 

 the wire-worm.* 



* I am indebted to W. Spence, Esq., for the last above-mentioned notice; 

 and I have introduced it as a foot-note, being in doubt whether the larvae 

 in question were really wire-worms, or the grubs of A'grotis segetis, which are 

 exceedingly destructive to turnips, and which, I may here take the oppor- 

 tunity of stating, have been selected as the subject for the next year's prize 

 essays of the Entomological Society. The notice appeared in the West- 

 Briton, a provincial paper, during the month of November last ; and is as 

 follows : — 



^' Interesting to Farmers. — Mr. George Pearce of Pennare Goi'an, having 

 been obliged to plough up a piece of ground, about an acre and a half, which 

 he had sown with wheat, in consequence of the wire-worm having nearly de- 

 stroyed the whole, sowed it with turnips ; but, finding that the worms had com- 

 menced their work of destruction on that crop, he employed boys to collect 

 them, and at first gave them twopence per hundred. Finding they would 

 pick easily 600 per day, he reduced their allowance to three halfpence per 

 hundred; and they have gathered the surprising number of 18,000, besides 

 what Mr. Pearce and his servants picked up. By this means, Mr. Pearce 

 has saved about one acre of turnips ; which, no doubt, would have been com- 

 pletely destroyed. The boys soon found out, by the sickly appearance of the 

 plant, when the enemy had taken possession of it; and, having removed the 



I 3 



