20 BULLETIX 156, U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 



liable. The best account of the species of which we are cognizant is 

 that of Comstock and Slingerland. 1 



On March 13, 1912, Mr. J. J. Davis received a communication report- 

 ing a very bad outbreak of wireworms on corn at Watertown, Wis., in 

 1911. The fields attacked were low-lying peaty muck-lands that had 

 been reclaimed by tile draining. The correspondent said that he 

 "plowed up a strip of land early last spring and turned up these 

 insects by the millions, so that some of the furrows looked real 

 white." Larva? were inclosed with this communication and proved 

 to be of this beetle. In June. 1913, Mr. Davis visited this locality 

 and collected a number of the larvae and sent them to the writer 

 alive. They were confined in rearing cages on June 6. August 5 a 

 pupa was found, and on August 11 the adult emerged from the 

 pupa. Another larva pupated on September 2 and the adult emerged 

 on September 11. These two records limit the pupal stage to nine 

 days. 



For this species we recommend plowing sodland, intended for corn 

 the succeeding year, during late August. Cultivate corn as late as 

 possible, and plow small-grain stubble during August, rf possible. 



Another genus of importance in this group is Monocrepidius. The 

 two species of this genus recorded as attacking cereal and forage 

 crops in the United States are quite distinct. One {Monocrepidius 

 lividus DeG. ) is a large species over one-half inch in length, of a dull, 

 even brown color. It is shaped very much like a Melanotus, but can 

 easily be distinguished from that genus by the simple tarsal claws. 

 The other species (Monocrepidius vespertinus Fab.) is a small 

 elongate beetle, a little over one-fourth inch long. The body is prettily 

 marked with yellow and dark brown. Both of these species are more 

 or less southern in distribution. M. lividus DeG. being distributed 

 over the entire southern part of the United States from Florida to 

 Texas and northward to northern Xew Jersey, scattering specimens 

 being collected as far north as Massachusetts, while M. vespertinus 

 covers the same territory, but is more generally distributed north- 

 ward. 



A third species, Jlonocrepidius hellus Say, is a very small form, 

 the beetle being hardly three-sixteenths of an inch long. This species 

 is quite often taken in cornfields during the summer and under stones 

 in pastures during the winter about Hagerstown, Md. Dr. F. H. 

 Chittenden 2 records this species as having been reared from larvae 

 feeding on the roots of creeping bent (Agrostis stolonifera) on the 

 department grounds at "Washington. 



1 Comstock, J. II., and Slingerland, M. V. Wireworms. Cornell Univ. Agr. Exp. Sta., 

 Bui. ?.::, p. 270, Nov., 1891. 



2 U. S. Dept. Agr., Div. Ent., Notes, v. 10, Xo. 7472. 



