1913] 
Burrill. The Giant Midge, Chironomus plumosus. 
149 
although a related species seems to cause the death of snails 
(Barnard 1911, 76-8). 
I can not refrain in closing the economic review, from retell¬ 
ing a fairy story of Reaumur’s (1737, 179 et seq.) as showing 
what has since been ascertained that plnmosus undoubtedly does 
not do. 
He speaks of collecting bloodworms on oak leaves, etc., fallen 
into lakes of the “bois de Bologne” (the street in Paris, we pre¬ 
sume) and quotes a letter published in the Academy in 1666, 
claiming that these bloodworms bore holes in stones, actually bur¬ 
row out cavities in the stones and that, likewise, they had been 
proved dangerous to stone walls of various structures. 
This lengthy quotation tries to establish other astounding facts, 
namely, that the worms get into timbers, comminuting the wood 
until the floors and walls of houses may cave in. Fortunately, for 
the long-suffering public and the researcher trying to disentangle 
truth from fancy, Chironomus has not lived up to all these alle¬ 
gations, or it would have gained long since so unenviable a repu¬ 
tation as to have engaged the attention of economic workers to 
study out its whole life habits. 
REMEDIAL MEASURES. 
Nature will usually take care of a large part of any epidemic 
of plumosus, as shown in the preceding notes about their enemies 
and fungus diseases. During the summer of 1911, plumosus was 
seen at Madison in July, August, and September, but only one 
to six individuals were noted at any one time. So far as known, 
the May and June swarms of midges did not include many of the 
plumosi. The dry summer of 1911 seems to indicate that 
plumosus makes no such large swarms in this small lake region 
asi about Lake Winnebago. At South Oshkosh, Wis., Aug. 28, 
1911, Mr. J. W. Roe informed me of an article of his dealing 
with this midge nuisance about 1908-10 for the Daily Northwest¬ 
ern, Oshkosh. He claims that the midges were there in August 
of 1911 in less than usual numbers, the swarms varying greatly 
from year to year. Midges interfered with his business of small 
summer resort cottages in that region very little. In most years, 
a week hardly passes without a west wind springing up and blow- 
