46 



farmer and gardiner to cultivate assiduously the acquaintance of all his insect friends, for 

 although their individual efforts may be feeble, yet combined they no doubt maintain a power- 

 ful check on insect enemies. 



Another common insect which is subject to attacks of Lady Birds is the well-known and 

 universal Colorado Potato Beetle. Five species of our friends are known to devour this beetle 

 — the spotted, the nine-spotted, the thirteen-spotted, the convergent, and the icy. Lady 

 Birds; the latter, Hippodamia glacialis, Fabr., is closely allied to the Convergent Lady Bird, 

 and is found far north, and may be taken under the ice and snow. The larvae of these are 

 equally as voracious as the perfect beetles, but the larva of the H. convergens is a perfect 

 cannibal, for when there is a deficiency of other good food, he has no hesitation in devouring 

 the helpless pupce of his own kind. 



The Grape Phylloxera, Fhylloxera vasfatrix, Planchon, has been found to be attacked 

 by several species of the genera Coccinella and Scymnus, whose young, thickly covered with 

 white and evenly shorn tufts of a cottony secretion, are frequently found at their good work 

 within the o;alls. The last pest we will now mention is 



The Pine-Leaf Scale Insect, Mytilaspis pinifolice, Fitch, a bark-louse which injures 

 many of the pine trees, as the red, the white, the yellow, the Pyrenian, the Scotch and 

 others. The twice-stabbed Lady Bird may frequently be found crawling over the scale- 

 infested trees, and is most efficient in checking the increase of the Coccids. Both the beetle 

 and its gray and prickly larva feast upon the lice, and require great numbers of such minute 

 animals to appease their appetites. I have often colonized a dozen or more larvae on to a 

 badly affected young tree, and the rapidity with which they clear such a tree is both interest- 

 ing and satisfactory. Still another insect of this family, namely, the Painted Lady Bird 

 (Coccinella Ida, Randall), I have discovered preying on our Pine-leaf Scale. (See Riley's 

 Fifth Annual Report). 



AN OUTLINE SKETCH OF THE CANADIAN BUPRESTID^. 



By James Fletcher, Ottawa. 



Of all the enemies against which man has to contend, there are none, perhaps, which 

 are so hard to combat, nor which deserve more attention, than those belonging to the insect 

 world. 



These tiny atoms, apparently so insignificant, in some instances so small, as to need the 

 closest search, or even a microscope, to discover, beset him in every direction, and, if ignored, 

 will cut, pierce, and, in some cases, utterly destroy whatever his labour produces. Not many 

 years ago Entomology was one of the most neglected Sciences, and only considered worthy 

 of the attention of simple people and children, as describing pretty things likely to amuse 

 them ; to such an extent was this carried, that as late as the last century a lady of high rank 

 in France was burned as a witch, the only evidence against her being that she was seen to 

 <5ollect and preserve insects. Even at the present day, both in England and Canada, there 

 is much deplorable ignorance of La belle Science " among the very people to whom, more 

 than any one else, a knowledge of it is of the first importance. I have frequently been 

 greeted with smiles of amusement (which have had a good strong admixture of pity in them) 

 from farmers and countrymen, when asking for permission to collect on their grounds, the 

 general tenor of their answers being, " Oh, yes, I suppose you won't do much harm and I 

 have always been under a very decided impression that they looked down upon me as a poor 

 innoxious creature that could do no harm. Many a quiet chuckle have I had in the deepest 

 recesses of my sleeve, and many a quiet ramble, too, have I enjoyed, by this means perfectly 

 immuned from all interruption by game keepers or farm labourers, who regard the Entomo- 

 logist {Angl: " Fly-catcher," Amer : " Bug-catcher,") much in the same light that they view 

 the rooks that pick up the worms after the ploughman. These good simple fellows (not that 

 ^ I wish in the least to retaliate) will sometimes endeavour to encourage you, and even assist 

 in collecting insects, which in the case of Coleoptera, are occasionally good specimens ; but 

 that is the exception, and by no means the general rule, especially with Lepidoptera. On one 

 occasion during the past summer, I was hailed by a gardener who informed me that he had 

 a " bug " for me, and who, after fumbling in his trousers' pocket for a short time, produced a 

 tin tobacco-box, and then, from beneath some very black, damp-looking tobacco, disentombed 



