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‘ 
WIREWORMS ATTACKING CEREAL AND FORAGE CROPS. 19 
about three-sixteenths of an inch long, reddish-brown in color, and 
moderately hairy. The wireworm is about three-fourths of an inch 
in length and is depressed, with a shallow emargination in the ter- 
minal segment; the color, as in the beetle, 1s reddish-brown. 
The species is recorded as attacking corn, potatoes, tomatoes, 
onions, cabbage, radishes, turnips, horseradish, and spinach. It bur- 
rows into the underground parts of the plants, quite ruining them for 
market purposes, and in the case of corn, tomatoes, cabbage, and 
onions often kills the plant. This species does not seem to attack 
beans, peas, cucumbers, melons, rhubarb, lettuce, and peppers, and 
these crops might be of value in clearing a badly infested field prior 
to seeding it to grain. 
The sugar-beet wireworm (Limonius californicus Mann.) is a 
very serious pest to alfalfa and corn over restricted areas in Calli- 
fornia.t Alfalfa is so badly infested in certain localities that it 
has to be plowed out and reseeded every three or four years. This 
species lays its eggs during late April. The eggs hatch during late 
May and the larve spend the remainder of that season and the whole 
of the two succeeding seasons in the ground. They pupate during 
July and August of their third summer, the adults remaining in the 
pupal cells until the spring of the fourth year. Alfalfa fields badly 
infested with this wireworm should be plowed out immediately after 
the first crop is harvested and harrowed several times before re- 
seeding. Land intended for corn should be plowed in late July or 
August of the year preceding cropping. Land in corn should be 
deeply cultivated during August. 
The abbreviated wireworm (Cryptohypnus abbreviatus (Say) ) oc- 
curs over the entire northern part of the United States, being quite 
common in New England and New York, and is recorded from New 
Jersey by Smith.? In the upper Mississippi Valley this species is 
also a pest and specimens have been collected in Utah and Wash- 
ington. 
The beetles of this species are very small, being little over three- 
sixteenths inch in length and quite broad and flattened. The color 
is very dark brown to almost black and the forepart of the body is 
very shiny. An obscure yellowish spot ornaments each wing cover 
near the tip. The legs are also obscure reddish-yellow. 
The wireworm is about one-half inch long, flattened, with a pair of 
backwardly directed prongs on the ninth abdominal segment, and is 
pale yellow in color. 
Owing to the confusion of this wireworm with Drasterius elegans 
Fab., the literature relative to either of these insects is very unre- 
1Graf, John E, A Preliminary Report of the Sugar-Beet Wireworm. U.S. Dept. Agr., 
Bur. Ent., Bul. 123, 68 p., 9 figs., 23 pl., Feb. 28, 1914. 
?Smith, J. B. Catalogue of the Insects Found in New Jersey, p. 159. Trenton, 1890. 
