56 NEW YORK STATE MUSEUM 



people attempting to distinguish the various species. Fortunately 

 they are so distinct from other insects that there is little danger of their 

 being confused therewith, and so far as practical considerations 

 are concerned, there is small need to distinguish between the closely 

 related forms, since all have very nearly the same habits. The 

 feeding of these beetles, while rarely seriously injurious to affected 

 trees, may be taken advantage of to some extent to indicate the 

 approximate amount of injury which may be expected from the 

 grubs the following season. 



Preventives and remedies. The three-year life cycle of these 

 pests and the marked tendency of the beetles to deposit their eggs in 

 the more luxuriant adjacent grass, makes it comparatively easy to 

 anticipate injuries, especially if some attention is paid to the amount 

 of feeding by the beetles upon forest and other trees. It should be 

 remembered that damage by the beetles precedes by approxi- 

 mately twelve months the most severe injury likely to accompany 

 the feeding of the grubs. 



Again, the eggs are laid in June and in September or early October 

 small white grubs one-fourth to half of an inch long are readily 

 found about grass roots and usually within three inches of the surface 

 of the soil. Land badly infested in this manner should be plowed 

 as soon as possible, disked once or twice and, if practical, fowls or 

 hogs allowed to run over the ground for a time and destroy many 

 of the pests. Such land should not be planted with potatoes, corn 

 or other susceptible crops. Small grains, especially rye, buckwheat, 

 clover and vetch, may be sown and if the seeding is early enough 

 it may be possible to avert the damage which would normally occur 

 the following season if nothing were done. Land in good cultiva- 

 tion at the time the beetles fly is rarely badly infested by eggs though 

 occasionally grubs may work into such ground from adjacent strips 

 of sod such as that lying along a fence or the margin of another field. 



Land badly infested with grubs one-half to three-fourths grown, 

 the condition obtaining in the fall of 191 5 in many localities, may 

 be planted with susceptible crops in the spring of 19 16 with a moderate 

 degree of safety if the planting is delayed until the early part or 

 possibly the middle of June, since at about that time the grubs 

 will have largely ceased feeding. 



The extended life cycle of these pests and their restriction to 

 grasslands make it apparent that systematic rotation of crops is 

 one of the most important preventive measures that can be employed. 

 A rotation which does not allow land to remain in sod for more than 

 two or three years, if generally followed in a neighborhood, will 



