FUKNITUKE BEETLES 



I.— GENERAL INTRODUCTION 



It is not infrequently the householder's lot to see some 

 valued piece of furniture or some part of the wood-work in the 

 house damaged or destroyed by what is commonly known as 

 the worm, — little six-legged, white grubs which live inside the 

 wood devouring it and turning it to powder. 



These destructive grubs eventually become small beetles. The 

 worm or grub has to the beetle the same relationship that a 

 caterpillar has to the butterfly or moth into which it will turn. 



A beetle is, like a butterfly, one of those insects which in the 

 course .of their life undergo a complete metamorphosis or change 

 of form. Coming from an egg to begin with, it appears at first 

 in the form of a larva or grub. The larva feeds actively and 

 continues to grow for a more or less prolonged period, until, 

 when full-led and full-grown, there comes a resting stage ; then 

 it is transformed into a pupa or chrysalis, from which, after a 

 further lapse of time, the beetle emerges to appear shortly after in 

 the full development of form and colour which it will retain for 

 the rest of its days. 



In its final form a beetle usually has two pairs of wings, but 

 the front wings are quite unlike ordinary insect-wings ; they are 

 the hard, scale-like structures which, meeting by their inner edge 

 along the middle line form a sheath or cover over the middle and 

 hinder part of its back. The hind wings or true flying wings of a 

 beetle, when not displayed in flight, are kept folded and hidden 

 for the most part beneath its modified fore- wings, which hence 

 receive the name of wing-cases or elytra. 



There are very many different species of beetles in the world 

 whose larvae live in wood and damage it to a more or less serious 

 extent by feeding on it and forming tunnels or burrows as they 

 eat their way in various directions. Where a great number of 



