2 
SPECIAL BULLETIN NO. 8 
Injuring Plant above Ground 
Cutworms. — Plump, smooth, greenish gray caterpillars, from one inch to two 
inches long. They usually work at night, cutting off the young plant close to the 
ground, and hide during the day in the soil or/ under cover near the injured plant. 
Bill-bugs. — Hard, oval, black or clay-colored beetles having a long snout or 
beak. Usually they are found head downward on the stalk, which they puncture 
‘ with the beak. When the leaf unrolls rows of holes are seen across the blade. 
Grasshoppers. — Too well known to need description. They eat leaves, husks, 
and silks about the borders of the field, in summer or fall. 
Ear-worms. — B-rownish or greenish striped caterpillars. They eat the kernels. 
Chinch bugs. — Black-and-white bugs, smaller ones red, found in large num- 
bers on outer surface of the stalk or beneath the leaf-sheaths. Those on corn usu- 
ally come from wheat after cutting. They leave the plant in a wilted or sickly 
condition from loss of sap. 
JJ V ^ 
Fig. ]. Click Beetle and Wireworms (Brehm) 
WIREWORMS 
Wireworms often destroy the seed in the ground by boring into the kernel and 
frequently kill the young plants by eating the roots and by burrowing into the 
stalk. When full grown they are about one inch long, dark brown, and shiny, with 
a hard, smooth, jointed outer skeleton.^ They wriggle and bend vigorously when 
held in the fingers. They have six jointed legs just behind the head and an additional 
proleg or prop on the last segment of the body. They eventually transform to the 
rather common medium sized, efongate, dark brown click beetles, so called because 
when placed upon their backs they spring into the air with a sharp, clicking sound. 
Life History 
The beetles come out of the ground early in the spring and lay their eggs in 
the soil, usually in grass lands. The eggs hatch into wireworms, which require at 
least two years to complete their growth. About midsummer of the year in which 
they become full grown they form little cells in the soil in which they transform to 
the pupal or resting stage and again change, three or four weeks later, to the adult 
beetles, most of which remain in the soil until spring. 
