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Ducks.and the Colorado Potato Beetle: Additional Note. 
In INsEcT LIFE, vol. m1, No. 9-10, page 390, I find an article on Ducks and the Col- 
orado Potato Beetle. I wish to add a little experience of last year in my garden, 
where I had a small patch of potatoes. In this patch my two ducks and one drake were 
very partial and not one of the Philistines (bugs) could be found. We thought they 
had left for better clover feed, but on reading the article in INsEcT LiFE I think it 
is another proof of the duck’s usefulness in that field of labor or direction.—[ John 
Taylor, New Sharon, Me., July 14, 1891. 
Kerosene Emulsion Treatment for the Rose Chafer. 
Having another year’s experience with the Rose Chafer, I will relate it for the ben- 
efit of others. Last year, as I wrote you, I found shaking on stretchers saturated 
with crude petroleum the only effective remedy. This year I experimented with a 
preparation called sludgite, a combination of petroleum and soap. Found it of no 
avail. Then I prepared a lot of kerosene emulsion, 2 gallons of oil, 1 gallon of water, 
one-half pound common soap. First to test it I caught anumber of the bugs, dipped 
them in the emulsion and found that every one died ina few minutes. I tried dip- 
ping in the sludgite solution and found that it did not kill them. Then I diluted 
the emulsion, one part of emulsion to eight parts of water. Found by dipping it was 
just as effective in killing the bugs as the standard emulsion. 1sprayed my vines 
and found it killed some and disturbed all. Thinking this might not be effective, I 
discontinued on grape vines, but found a lot of cherry trees and peach trees infested 
with them. I sprayed about twenty cherry trees from which hundreds of bugs could 
have been picked, and was so successful that after two sprayings not a bug could be 
found; neither did they trouble the trees, either peach or cherry, again. Iam in- 
clined to think we may have an effective remedy in the emulsion, and I think it will 
be more effective when warmed.—[E. H. Wynkoop, Catskill, N. Y., July 31, 1891, 
The Strawberry Weevil on Blackberries. 
I inclose a few Curculionids that are proving quite destructive to the buds of 
blackberries (especially of the Wachusett variety) about here. I find nothing about 
any such pest 1n the literature of my own library. Can you give me the name or any 
references ?—[ George Dimmock, Canobie Lake, N. H., June 15, 1891. 
Rep.Ly.—This is a species commonly known in collections as Anthonomus musculus 
and which I have treated in my report for 1885 under the caption of ‘‘ Strawberry 
Weevil.” You will find a somewhat elaborate article in this report on pages 276 to 
282, while the species is illustrated on Plate 7 at Figs. 5 and 6.—[June 18, 1891.] 
Predaceous Habit of Histeride. 
All of the authors which I have been able to consult upon the habits of Histeride 
(Packard, Harris, Le Baron, and Horn) state that these insects live in excrements, in 
decayed animal or vegetable matter, beneath the bark of trees, in ants’ nests, and so 
on, but none of them even so much as hint at their predaceous habits. A few weeks 
ago I saw an adult Hister sexstriatus Lec. attack a nearly full-grown larva of Agrotis 
ypsilon Rott., seizing it with its jaws as a cat would a rat and holding on despite the 
attempts of the cut-worm to escape. This was late in the afternoon of a cloudy day. 
and as my time was limited, I placed both specimens in my cyanide bottle, where 
the unequal combat soon terminated.—[D. W. Coquillett, Los Angeles, Cal., June 
8, 1891. 
