412 



Grain Weevils. 



[OCT., 



birds had taken oats. It is considered that if any injury is done 

 to the farming or fishing interests it is due to abnormal increase, 

 and that if the birds can obtain a sufficiency of insect or annelid 

 (worms) food they will not resort greatly to either fish or 

 cereals. The large proportion of insects and worms taken is 

 sufficient proof as to the kind of food preferred, but if the bird 

 should become so abundant as to occasion a shortage of this 

 class of food, there is a probability of its becoming more ad- 

 dicted to the taking of grain (a habit which seems to have only 

 been observed during recent years), and to eating fish when 

 procurable. 



Grain weevils (Calandra gr anuria and Calandru oryzce) 

 are extremely destructive to stored grain and to cargoes of 

 grain in ships. Cargoes of grain and 

 Grain Weevils. rice carried long distances sometimes 

 arrive swarming with the pests. The 

 weevils, too, are often very troublesome in breweries and 

 malting sheds. Wheat, barley, oats, and Indian corn may be 

 infested and C. oryzce, as its specific name implies, is very 

 harmful to rice. 



The harm is done both by the adult weevils and their grubs. 

 The weevils feed on the grain, eating into it and so hollowing 

 it out that a mere husk may be left. After the contents of the 

 grain have been partly eaten away, it is common to find several 

 weevils at work inside the damaged grain. The grub is hatched 

 inside the grain and spends its whole life there, so that by 

 the time it is full grown the grain is ruined. The species 

 of the genus Culundru are really natives of warmer countries 

 abroad, but some of the species have been spread in commerce 

 and C. granuriu at least may now be considered a native 

 of European countries. 



Characteristics of these weevils are the long snout with 

 elbowed antennae, and the narrowed body with its long thorax. 



Description. — C. grunariu measures J- in. in length. In 

 colour the beetle is brownish-black or pitchy ; the elbowed 

 antennae and the six legs are reddish. The snout or rostrum, 

 with the mouth at the end of it, is long but is rather shorter 

 and stouter in the male than in the female. If examined with 

 a lens the thorax is seen to be covered with punctures ; the 



