PULEX. FIvEA. 



Compressed from side to side ; wingless ; piercing sucking rostrum ; great 

 jumping agility ; thorax with three rings, abdomen nine ; hairy ; strong legs 

 with two claws each. Oviparous : ovum in 6 to 12 days produces hairy 

 worm-like larva with 12 rings and bispiked tail ; in 11 days this spins a co- 

 coon, it moults, becomes a pupa and in 10 to 20.days a flea. Live in haunts 

 of. animals, hide in clothing, furniture, earth, sand, beds, nests, etc. ; prefer 

 given species of host but do not attack them alone. Facultative parasite. 

 Dog-flea : Fine tooth-like, black spines (14 to 18) beneath head and protho- 

 rax, each side ; harbors larva of tsenia canina. J^iea of Man : No teeth on 

 head nor prothorax. Rabbit-flea : Angular front of head ; five or six teeth 

 on head and prothorax, each side. Bird-flea : 12 to 13 teeth each side of 

 prothorax, none on head. Prevention : Boil blankets, rugs and clothing ; 

 scald kennels, dove-cots, poultry-houses, nests, etc. ; litter with fresh wal- 

 nut leaves or pine shavings ; insect powder ; stavesacre ; wormwood ; creo- 

 lin ; lysol ; cresyle ; carbolic acid ; oil of tar ; sticky fly-papers. Same 

 agents on animal, also laurel oil and snuff, potassium sulphide. For yards, 

 runs, etc., quicklime, chloride of lime, tar water. Beat rugs and furniture. 

 Sea-weed attracts and may then be burned. Chigoe : In tropical America 

 and Africa. Lives in green vegetation, sand, etc. ; burrows in skin of man, 

 and tame and wild mammals and birds ; lays eggs and hatches young in 

 galleries, causing irritation, ulceration, gangrene, and loss of parts. Bur- 

 rowing-flea 0/ Aen : In Ceylon. Treatment: Rub feet or legs with tobacco, 

 carapa or arnotto ; extract flea without escape of eggs ; kill with hot wire, 

 lunar caustic, tincture of iodine, benzine, phenol. Rhynchopsylla pulex, a 

 flea with long hooks on jaws, and, in female, long abdomen, on parrot. 

 Helminthopsylla : Alakurt : With worm-like abdomen on cattle, horses, 

 sheep and camels in Turkestan. 



Fleas are usually considered as a sub-order of the diptera, but 

 they are permanently wingless, have their bodies flattened from 

 side to side, a piercing and sucking proboscis, and great jumping 

 powers. 



The head is small, round or angular, with two serrated maA- 

 dibles, between which is a rigid perforated stylet and sucker, and 

 a lower lip terminating in two palpi. Two eyelets are placed in 

 front of the antennae. The thorax has three rings and the abdo- 

 men nine, the whole extremely flattened from side to side, and 

 covered with hairs. The legs thick and strong, the last segment 

 of each terminated by two claws, oviparous. 



The egg in six to twelve days produces a vermiform, hairy 

 larva of twelve rings and head. This has mandibles, antennse, 

 88 



