HARVEST MITES. 



137 



a common enemy. It is so with this species. Mr. Harris, in his 

 treatise on some of the insects of New England, injurious to vege- 

 tation (1852), drew attention to the fact that the locusts of the 

 eastern coasts of America were much infested by little red mites, 

 "belonging apparently to the genus Ocypete" (which is a synonym 

 for Atoma), and that these so much weakened the insects by suck- 

 ing the juices from their bodies as to hasten their death. Ten or a 

 dozen of them would frequently be found pertinaciously adhering 

 to the body of a locust beneath its wing covers and wings. The 

 dread of the locust has now passed from New England. It is in 

 the western prairies that it now reigns, where immense swarms of 

 locusts descend from the Rocky Mountains where they breed, and 

 spread desolation and famine over thousands of square miles. 

 But the little red mite that helped to reduce their numbers in the 

 East, or an equivalent species, is there at its post in the West, 

 employed on the same duty ; and the value of its services has been 

 recognised and acknowledged by numerous observers. In 1 87 2 and 

 1875, respectively, it was described by Mr. Le Baron, State Ento- 

 mologist of Illinois, and Mr. Riley, State Entomologist of Missouri. 

 In their opinion it is as formidable an enemy to the Rocky Moun- 

 tains locusts as it was in former years to that of the East These 

 locusts are often more or less covered with them, especially round 

 the base of the wings. We reproduce Mr. Riley's figure of one 

 of the mites. They are small red creatures, no bigger than the 

 head of a pin, soft and extensible, and they swell like a tick, so 

 that their six legs, though easily visible when the animal first 

 attaches itself, become more or less invisible as it swells; although 

 on careful examination they will always be found. The mite 

 when so attached presents itself as a bright red, swollen, ovoid 

 body, immovably attached to its supporter. So far as is yet 

 known it has not been traced beyond the six-legged larva stage, 

 but it will certainly be found to be developed into an eight- 

 legged scarlet mite. Very probably the next species, which is 

 found in the same localities, and whose mission is also to keep 



