138 INDIRECT INJURIES CAUSED BY INSECTS. 



from this cause) one third of the wheat crop on the richest 

 plains of Piedmont was destroyed by this seemingly insignifi- 

 cant little insect. ^ 



One would thinlc, when laid up in the barn or in the gra- 

 nary, that wheat would be secure from injury; but even 

 there the weevil ( Caladra granaria), in its imago as well as in 

 its larva state, devours it ; and sometimes this pest becomes 

 so infinitely numerous, that a sensible man, engaged in the 

 brewing trade, once told me, speaking perhaps rather hyper- 

 bolically, that they collected and destroyed them by bushels : 

 and no wonder, for a single pair of these destroyers may pro- 

 duce in one year above 6000 descendants. There are three 

 other insects that attack the stored wheat, which are more 

 injurious to it than even the weevil. One is a minute species 

 of moth ( Tinea granella L.), of which Leeuwenhoek has given 

 us a full history under the name of the wolf. Another is a 

 species of the same genus, at present not named, which, as 

 we are informed by Du Hamel, at one time committed dread- 

 ful ravages in the province of Angoumois in France, The 

 third is Trogosita carahoides, a kind of beetle, the grub of 

 which, called Cadelle, Olivier tells us did more damage to the 

 housed grain in the southern provinces of France than either 

 the weevil or the wolf. ^ 



In this place, too, must be noticed the caterpillars of a 

 moth (^Caradrina cubicularis), which Mr.Kaddon told me 

 were found in such quantities in a wheat-stack near Bristol, 

 when taken down to be thrashed, that he could have gathered 

 them up by handfuls, and they had done much injury to the 

 grain. 



Here I may just mention a few other insects which devour 

 grains that are the food of man, concerning which I have col- 

 lected no other facts. The rice-weevil (^Calandra oryzce) is 

 very injurious to the useful grain after which it is named; as is 

 likewise another small beetle, Lyctus dentatus F. (^Sylvanus 

 Latr.); and an Indian grain, called in the country Joharre, 

 which appears to be a species of Holcus or Milium, is the 



1 Haliday in Entom. Mag. v. 444. 



3 Trans. Ent. Soc. Land. ii. proc. xlii. 



2 Oliv. ii. n. 19. 3, 4. 



