THE AMERICAN ENTOMOLOGIST. 



179 



to occur oil almost every variety growii. As 

 alrc<atly stated, there can be little doubt but that 

 the greater part of the second brood of worms 

 passes the winter in the cocoon on the fallen 

 loaves; and, in such an event, many of them 

 may be destroyed by raking up and burning the 

 leaves at any time during the winter. The 

 berries attacked by the worm may easily be 

 detected, providing there is no '' grape rot" in 

 the vineyard, cither by a discolored spot as 

 shown at Figure 123 c, or by the entire discolor- 

 ation and shrinking of the berry, as shown at 

 Figure 123 d. When the vineyard is attacked 

 by the " rot," the wormy berries are not so 

 easily distinguished, as they bear a close rosem- 

 blaiice to the rotting ones. 



Many wine makers are in the habit of picking 

 up all fallen berries, and of converting them into 

 V7inc. The wine made from such berries is but 

 third-rate, it is true; but we strongly recom- 

 mend the practice, as upon racking oft" the 

 juice obtained from them, countless luiinbcrs of 

 those worms are found in the sediment, while 

 unseen hosts of them are also, most likely, 

 crushed with the husks. Those who do not 

 make wine should pick up and destroy all fallen 

 berries. 



POISONOUS FLOUR. 



1/ 



The olack Snout-beetle, {Sitopliilusyranarius, 

 Linn.), about one-fifth of an inch long, whichis 

 conmionly found in granaries preying upon 

 small grain, and which was introduced into this 

 country a long time ago from Europe, is the only 

 grain-feeding insect properly called " the "Wee- 

 vil." The orange-colored larva, indeed, of the 

 Wheat-midge {Diplosis iritici, Kirby), Avhich 

 infests small grain, not in the granary, but in 

 the field, is frequently designated by this name 

 of " Weevil ;" and in the West is otherwise 

 known as the " Ked Weevil," and in the East 

 as the " Milk Weevil." But this is a mere pop- 

 ular misnomer; for this last insect belongs in 

 reality to the Two-winged Flies (Order Bi]'- 

 lera), and all the true Weevils belong to the 

 Beetles (Order Coleoptcra). 



We have recently been informed by Dr. W. 

 1). Hartman, of West Chester, Penn., that "in 

 theJSouth this beetle has been used successfully 

 as a substitute for the Spanish Blister-beetle 

 (Canlharideii) , and with this advantage over 

 the foreign insect, that it does not cause stran- 

 gury, to escape from which," as Dr. Ilartnian 

 further observes, "is a very great and impor- 

 tant item in the action of a blister." We arc 

 not intormed how the above discovery came to 

 be made in tlic Southern States ; but infer that 



it was probably from the great scarcity there of 

 the imported Spanish lly, during the late war, 

 in consequence of the rigid stringency of the 

 blockade of their sea-ports. Dr. Hartman goes 

 on to suggest, that it would be a very good idea 

 to ascertain experimentally, whether the Colo- 

 rado Potato-bug may not possess the same medi- 

 cinal powers as the Grain AYeevil, and the true 

 Blister-beetles {Lyitu) both native and exotic; 

 and that, in that event, we might turn the hate- 

 ful pest to some practical account. 



There can be no doubt that great lumibers ot 

 this Grain Weevil are often ground up into 

 Hour; and that, although the coarser and harder 

 parts of them, such as the legs, snouts and wing- 

 cases, would probably bo for the most part re- 

 tained by the bolting-cloth, yet that a consider- 

 able portion of the body will be ground up lino 

 enough to be incorporated Viiili the Extra Su- 

 pertine Family Flour, of which most of us par- 

 take every day. In that event, if the number of 

 AV^ecvils should be large, the Hour would un- 

 doubtedly be poisonous ; for we know now that 

 those Weevils have nearly the same medicinal 

 properties as Spanish flies, and Spanish flics, as is 

 notorious, are, even in comparatively very small 

 doses, a most violent and dangerous drug to 

 take internally, and when swallowed in lai-gcr 

 doses are a deadly poison. 



That this is not a purely speculative view of 

 the subject is proved by the following passage 

 from the Transactions of the London Entumo- 

 lofjical Society;* which, be it remembered, was 

 written a great many years ago, and long before 

 it was discovered in our Southern Slates that 

 the Grain Weevil raised as good a blister as the 

 true Blister-beetles or Cantlmrides of the shops : 

 " A medical man in Madeira assured Mr. Mills, 

 that he considered the wings and the cruslaccous 

 parts of the AVecvil so heating to the system, as 

 to be almost as injurious as Caniharides, taken 

 internally, on a slow scale." 



May not a remarkable case, which occurred in 

 1868 in tho State of New York, of a particular 

 lot of flour from a particular juill having pois- 

 oned all those who used it, and which was ac- 

 counted for at the time on the h\pothesis of a 

 small quantity of lead having been ground up 

 along with the flour, be in reality explicable on 

 the theory of this flour having been mamifac- 

 turcd from old bugg\' wheat, full of this pai- 

 ticular species of Weevil? At all events, no 

 flour made from wheat, containing any consid- 

 erable percentage of these Weevils, ought ever 

 to be employed for human food. Such an arti- 

 cle is only fit for the starch-makers. 



* Volume I, p. 2ii; <iU0tca iu Cmtis' s Farm Insects, p. 333. 



v-^,i-:t\^-"''' 



