6 THE IMPORTED ELM LEAF-BEETLE. 
lent opportunities thus offered for experiment and study have siuee 
been improved, and, with some prefatory passages in relation to the 
history and habits of the beetle, we will give the practical results 
reached. 
AN IMPORTATION FROM EUROPE. 
This beetle has done great mischief in the Old World, especially in 
Germany and France, and it is very important that the public know 
the best method of coping with it here. According to Glover, it was 
imported as early as 1837. Its distribution was formerly confined to 
limited areas near the coast, and its earlier attacks were notably about 
Baltimore and Xew Jersey. 
HABITS AND NATURAL HISTORY. 
The general characteristics of this insect have been pretty well studied 
abroad. Mr. E. Heeger* has given au excellent account of its life-his- 
tory, with a detailed description of the larva, and figures illustrating 
larva and pupa and anatomical details. More recently M. Maurice 
Girardt has given a rather poor wood-cut illustration of the insect and 
its work, with the leading facts concerning its nomenclature and nat- 
ural history as observed in Europe. Biological notes on the insect 
have also beeu given by LeinweberJ and Kollar. § 
In our eountry the life-history of the insect and its injury have been re- 
ferred to by Harris, Fitch, Morris, Walsh, and ourselves, while the agri- 
cultural papers contain numerous references to the injury inflicted by the 
insect. The perfect beetle has often been described in systematic works 
on Coleoptera. 
For these reasons we deem it unnecessary to enter here into a detailed 
description of the beetle and its earlier stages, but content ourselves 
with pointing out the more obvious characters, alluding to such facts of 
the life-history as are necessary to a full understanding of the nature 
of the remedies to be applied for this pest. 
The eggs are deposited in an upright position upon the under side of 
the leaves (Fig. 1 a), always in a group, consisting generally of two, rarely 
three, more or less irregular rows. The individual eggs are close together 
in each group (Fig. 1 e, magnified), and so firmly fastened to the leaf 
that they can only be detached with great care without breaking the thin 
and brittle shell. The number of eggs in each group varies from four 
or five to twenty or more. Very rarely only three eggs are seen in one 
group, but we never found less than that number. The egg itself is 
oblong oval, obtusely, but not abruptly, pointed at tip, of straw-yellow 
* Seventeenth contribution to the natural history of insects. Sitzungsberichte der 
kais. Ac. Wiss., Wien, 1858, vol.29, p. 100-120, 6 pi. 
tNote sur la Galeruque de l'orrae. Bull. d'Inseetologie Agricole, 1878, III, pp. 
113-116. 
t Verhandlungen zool.-bot. Ges.,Wien, 1856, VI; Sitzb., pp. 74-75. 
§ Op. cit,, 1858, VIII; Abh., pp. 29-30. 
