INSECTS AFFECTING PARK AND WOODLAND TREES 50I 



search of beetles or for entrances to galleries of the bark borers, in which 

 the females deposit eggs. These soon hatch, and the minute active 

 grubs find their way into the egg and brood galleries of the bark borers 

 where they may frequently be found by the collector. These beneficial 

 grubs feed on the eggs and young of the bark borers till they have attained 

 full growth, when they leave the inner bark and excavate cavities in the 

 outer bark where the transformation to the adult occurs. 



This clerid attacks and feeds on all kinds of bark beetles which infest 

 the spruce and pine, and it has also been found attacking bark beetles in 

 deciduous trees. It is a common insect wherever pine and spruce grow in 

 West Virginia according to Dr Hopkins. This beneficial species is unfor- 

 tunately preyed on by at least two parasites. One braconid apparently 

 attacks the full grown larva when it enters the outer bark to pupate and 

 lives within its host. This parasite is in turn attacked by another which 

 Dr Hopkins bred in large numbers from clerid larvae. A small, two winged 

 fly, resembling a house fly, deposits its eggs on the living beetle, and the 

 maggot hatching therefrom, enters the abdomen and subsists by absorbing 

 nourishment from the body fluids of its host. The infested beetles remain 

 alive and active, till the parasitic larva leaves it to undergo its final trans- 

 formations, which probably take place in the ground. This clerid has been 

 recorded by Dr Smith as generally, though locally, distributed through 

 New Jersey. Dr J. A. Lintner 1 observed numbers of these insects on cut 

 pine and timber at Schoharie, May 13, where they had probably been feed- 

 ing on wood-boring grubs. 



Bibliography 



1899 Hopkins, A. D. W. Va. Agric. Exp. Sta. Bui. 56, p. 262-64 



Elasmocerus terminatus Say 



A small, cylindric, nearly black beetle about %. inch long, may be found with Lyctus 

 and some other borers in infested wood. 



This very interesting clerid was obtained from a piece of ash badly 

 infested with Lyctus parallelopipedus Melsh., on which it evidently 

 preys. 



1 1888 Lintner, J. A. Ins. N. Y. 4th Rep't, p. 142. 



