INSECTS. 105 



much damage in meadows and grass land. Those 

 fields are most infested which bore grass or clover the 

 preceding year. Wireworms are usually more destruc- 

 tive in dry soil than in wet. They devour all under- 

 ground parts, but specially prefer fleshy organs 

 (potatoes, turnips), as well as the underground stem- 

 parts of grain-plants, working themselves up from the 

 soil into the inside of the lower part of the haulm, 

 where they destroy the plant by gnawing its base. 

 They also often destroy, in young grain-plants, the 

 region of the stem which extends from the remains of 

 the seed to the surface (Fig. 76, left). In both cases 

 the plant is kiUed by the wireworms ; the injuring of 

 the roots is less fatal. It is obvious that in shallow sow- 

 ing only a small piece of underground stem is exposed 

 to the attacks of wireworms, in deep sowing a much 

 larger piece ; besides this, a plant which has been 

 sown shallow develops earlier a strong mass of roots, 

 and in its young state can therefore offer a greater 

 resistance to the destructive influence. Since wire- 

 worms require four or flve years for their development, 

 the same field is infested by them the whole year. 

 The greatest damage is done in spring and autumn. 

 When wireworms have gnawed into the lower part of 

 the haulm, the lower leaves first turn yeUow, and the 

 death of the whole plant soon follows. Remedies: 

 Repeated ploughing of fields infested by wireworms, 

 so that rooks, starlings, wagtails, gulls, etc., can devour 

 them. Perhaps, too, many larvse are frozen. Sowing 

 the seed as shallow as possible on infested fields 

 (Fig. 76). Waste potatoes may be used as a means 

 of drawing them from the crop. 



Family: Curculionidae (Weevils). 



Most species are small. Head lengthened into a 

 proboscis (Fig. 79, 3) ; the jaws are found at the front 

 end of the proboscis, the eyes at its base. The anteimse, 



