71 



A close inspection of the most seriously injured fields showed large areas 

 of grain totally destroyed, while other areas among them were little 

 injured. The plants themselves had not been thrown out by the frost, 

 but were well hxed in the soil. The day was rainy, and many of the 

 dead plants had a green appearance like that of wetted hay, and did 

 not at all resemble those killed by frost or freezing, indicating that they 

 had withered. 



Mr. Kendall stated that np to the 1st of February his wheat was in 

 fine condition, but after that time it began to die, and continued to do so 

 rapidly until about the first week in April, since which time the dep- 

 redations had gradually ceased. Soon after the trouble began he had 

 observed the larvae in myriads both above and below ground, but they 

 worked below, not cutting off the plants, out apparently wounding them 

 and sucking the juices. In working about just beneath the surface of 

 the ground they raised ridges like those made by moles, but about the 

 size of straws, and the earth immediately about the plants was often 

 worked up as if by ants or earth-worms. 



A large number of larvae and pupae were secured and taken home, 

 in order that I might be able to study the method of feeding in the 

 former, secure adults, and watch the oviposition of the females, which, 

 I judged, might differ from those previously studied in case they proved 

 to be of a different species. While collecting this material, not only 

 many dead pupae were noticed, but larvae also, lying on the surface of 

 the ground, many of which had turned black wholly or in part, after 

 the manner of diseased cabbage- worms. This led to the suspicion that 

 they had been attacked by a fungous disease, which had reduced their 

 number and consequent injury. While all living material was, on my 

 arrival home, placed in a breeding cage and thus kept out of doors, 

 nearly all of the pupae were destroyed, almost entirely, I believe, by this 

 fungoid enemy, which Dr. J. C. Arthur informs me is undescribed, and 

 for which he proposes the manuscript name Emjpusa pachyrrhinee. One 

 larva constructed its cell in the earth in the breeding cage and trans- 

 formed to the pupa, biit the next day this pupa worked itself upward 

 out of the cell and was found lying on the surface dead, and covered 

 with spores of Empusa. How much this fungus had to do with the 

 stopping of depredations of the larvae on the wheat it is, of course, im- 

 possible to say, but it must have destroyed a large percentage of the 

 pest. 



The first adult appeared in the cage on the 28th, two days after 

 removal from the field. Other adults emerged so very sparingly, and 

 at such long intervals, that no opportunity was offered to secure fer- 

 tilized eggs or note the ovipositing habits of the females. The first of 

 the only two females reared was nearly dead when a male emerged, 

 and, though fertilized, died without ovipositing, and the male refused 

 to pair a second time, leaving the second female without a mate, she 

 dying before a second male emerged. Two females and four males 



