REPORT OF THE STATE ENTOMOLOGIST I913 37 



in 1882. Dr C. Hart Merriam states that about the first of August 

 he observed that a large percentage of the sugar maple under growth 

 in Lewis county appeared to be dying, the leaves drooped, withered, 

 finally shriveled and died. Most of the seedlings attacked were 

 about a half an inch in diameter. He estimated that hundreds of 

 thousands of young sugar maples were killed in that locality. This 

 outbreak was evidently sporadic in nature, since there have been 

 no records of serious injury subsequently. 



Description. The original description of this borer is as follows ; 



Long. ij4 liiti- -^hort, thick, compressed, shining black, antennae 

 and feet ferruginous ; front glabrous ; prothorax roughly tuberculate 

 in front, shining behind, with fine sparse punctures ; elytra punc- 

 tured strongly, but not in rows, behind rounded, without furrows 

 or teeth. 



Dr A. D. Hopkins, in describing the allied C. columbianus 

 Hopk. states that in C. p u n c t a t i s s i m u s the head of the 

 female is deeply and coarsely punctured in front, the declivity of 

 the elytra plain, and that the middle and hind tibiae have only three 

 teeth near the tip. 



Galleries. The beetles enter the side of the stem at or below 

 the surface of the thick mulch, through a circular hole about one- 

 sixteenth of an inch in diameter. This may be more or less oblique 

 and opens into a more or less regular series of circular, closely 

 placed, horizontal galleries. These latter may be so numerous as 

 to leave only a very thin shelter of bark with a little of the outer 

 sapwood externally and almost no direct longitudinal wood fibers 

 between the outer and the inner horizontal galleries. From each 

 of these galleries there are a series of vertical brood chambers, 

 each about one-eighth of an inch long, and there is usually one or 

 more vertical or nearly vertical galleries which may lead to a lower 

 or upper series of workings, not infrequently both. These galleries 

 may be easily recognized by reference to the figure, on account of 

 their regular plan and the characteristically blackened walls. The 

 operations of this insect are confined to parts of the plant within 3 

 inches above the ground, and so far as our observations go, do not 

 penetrate the roots, though the lowest galleries may approach very 

 closely to the crown. 



Life history and habits. The life history of this species has not 

 been worked out in detail. Dr C. Hart Merriam first studied the 

 insect in sugar maple and has faithfully described its method of 

 work. It is perhaps significant that his attention was not attracted 

 to the operations of the insect until early in August. Dr E. A. 



