106 



place, however, before passing to the red ant to say that the bed-bug 

 has been found in the woods under the bark of trees, and that therefore 

 in country houses in certain localities the occasional presence of the 

 bugs is not necessarily a mark of uncleauliness. 

 It may be well also to state that there exist other allied bugs which 



possess much the same odor 

 and whose bite is even more 

 severe than that of the true 

 Bed-bug. The Bloodsucking 

 Cone-nose (Conorhimis san- 

 guisuga, Fig. 17) is one of 

 these. It is found occasion- 

 al, ft. ally in beds as far noith as 



Fig. 17.-CONORMXUS saxguisuga: a, mature bug; ft, ^ ew Jersey and Illinois, but 

 pupa. (After Kiley.) , , . . .... 



does not habitually breed in 

 such locations. Its bite is very painful and it will absorb a considerable 

 amount of blood. We show the adult bug and the nearly fall-grown 

 larva at 17. The colors are black and red. 



THE LITTLE RED ANT. 

 (Monomorium pTidraonis L. ) 



The " red ant," as this insect is almost universal^' called, is another 

 of the household pests which we seem to owe to the older civilization of 

 Europe, and, like other domestic pests, it has become almost cosmopol- 

 itan. It has been generally considered of North American origin, and 

 as one of the few American § species which has become wide-spread in 

 Europe. It is often confounded in the literature of the subject with 

 My r mica molesta Say, which is, however, a synonym. In the larger cities 

 of Europe it is as much of a pest today as it is in this country. It 

 probably received the scientific name of " Pharaoh's ant" on account 

 of a defective knowledge of Scripture on the part of its describer, who 

 doubtless imagined that ants formedoue of the plagues of Egypt in the 

 time of Pharaoh, whereas the only entomological plagues mentioned 

 were lice, flies, and locusts. 



Ordinarily in households this insect is not a nuisance from the actual 

 loss which it causes by consuming food products, but from its inordinate 

 faculty of getting into things. It is attracted by almost everything in 

 the house, from sugar to shoe polish, and from bath sponges to dead 

 cockroaches. It seems to breed with enormous fecundity, and the in- 

 cidental killing off of a thousand or so has little effect upon.the apparent 

 number. A house badly infested with these creatures is almost unin- 

 habitable. They form their nests in almost any secluded spot, between 

 the walls or under the floors or behind the base-boards, or among the 

 trash in some old box or trunk, or in the lawn or garden walk just out- 

 side the door. In each of these nests several females will be found, 

 each laying her hundreds of eggs and attended by a retinue of workers 



