WIEEWOEMS ATTACKING CEEEAL AND POBAGE CEOPS. 3 



forage crops confine their attention to the seed, roots, and under- 

 ground stems and are exclusively subterranean, with the single excep- 

 tion recorded by Mr. E. O. G. Kelly, of this office, wherein he mentions 

 finding a species {Monocrepidius vespertinus Fab.) damaging wheat 

 at Wellington, Kans., by boring in the hollow of the wheat stems 

 and not among the roots. 



Their depredations are first to be noticed, with the exception of 

 the cotton and corn wireworm, immediately after seeding, when they 

 attack the seed, eating out the inside and leaving only the hull. 

 When they are very numerous they often consume all the seed, mak- 

 ing reseeding necessary, and in severe outbreaks a second reseeding 

 is sometimes made before a stand is obtained. Aside from the extra 

 labor and cost of the seed, this delays the planting of the crop, and 

 if it be corn, in the Northern States the season is too short to ma- 

 ture so late-planted a crop and, except for the fodder, it is a failure. 

 Where wireworms are present, even in very small numbers, corn 

 will make a poor stand, which will necessitate the planting-in of 

 missing hills. In some regions where these insects are quite numer- 

 ous it is customary to sow three or four times the amount. of seed 

 that would normally be necessary in order to get a good stand. 



KINDS OF WIREWORMS. 



Several hundred species of Elateridee occur in North America. 

 They vary enormously in their habits, some forms living in dead and 

 rotten wood (Alaus, Elater, Adelocera, etc.). Alaus has also been 

 recorded as boring in solid wood, though the writer is inclined to 

 discredit this observation, and other species live under moss (Seri- 

 cosomus). A number of species abound in heavy moist soil filled 

 with humus (Melanotus, Agriotes, etc.), while some prefer well- 

 drained soils (Corymbites), and still others (Horistonotus) are most 

 destructive on high sandy land which is very poor in humus. Many 

 wireworms have been recorded as predaceous (Alaus, Hemirhipus, 

 Adelocera, etc.). I am told by Mr. T. H. Jones, recently associated 

 with the Rio Piedras Sugar Planters' Experiment Station, that the 

 large luminous elaterid (Pyrophorus luminosus Illiger) of the West 

 Indies is a decidedly beneficial insect, as it feeds on the Lachnosterna 

 larv;:e in the sugar-cane fields. Through the kindness of Mr. G. N. 

 Wolcott and Mr. R. H. Van Zwalenburg I now have (October, 1914) a 

 Pyrophorus larva from Cuba, one from Jamaica, and several from 

 Mayaguez, P. R. All of these larva? are living and apparently thriv- 

 ing on the larvae of our native Lachnosternas.^ That this insect may 

 some day be introduced into the southern United States as a natural 

 enemy of Lachnosterna is not at all improbable. At least one instance 



