STATE AGRICULTURAL SOCIETY. 
539 
blackish and whitish rings, it is more probable that his speci¬ 
mens were the same which I now have before me from Wiscon¬ 
sin. Be this as it may, the communication from Mr. Williams 
is important, as making us acquainted with an enemy of the 
wheat crop of which we heretofore have had no definite know¬ 
ledge, and which will undoubtedly at times be quite detrimental 
in tlie wheat-growing districts of our country. 
Although this species, like many others in this order, occurs 
upon the flowers of different plants, it is upon wheat, in all pro¬ 
bability, that it will be oftenest noticed, and to which it will 
prove most injurious. It may therefore appropriately be named 
the wheat Thrips, T. Tritici. 
Attached to the surface of the shrivelled flower-leaves in the 
quill in which these insects were sent me, I meet with what 
I doubt not are their eggs (see figure a, next page,) deposited pro¬ 
bably by one of the females after being imprisoned. They are so 
minute as to be wholly invisible tg the naked eye, except when 
placed upon clean white paper, when they can be merely dis¬ 
cerned, appearing like an atom of dark colored dust. Under the 
magnifier they are discovered to be of a bright red color, like par¬ 
ticles of sealing-wax, and of an oval almost globular form; and 
they are attached to the leaf by a short, thick, crinkled stalk or 
stem, which is of a dull white color. 
The larva (fig. b) resemble the perfect insects, except thai 
they are wholly destitute of wings and are smaller and softer, 
with the several segments of the body more equally and distinct¬ 
ly separated from each other by transverse, constricted lines. 
They are throughout of a bright orange-yellow color, of the 
same hue as the worms of the Wheat-midge, which worms, how¬ 
ever, small as they are, appear like giants when placed by the 
side of these larvae. 
Two minute black dots upon the anterior end of the head are the eyes. The 
head is square and hut half as broad as the second segment, which is broadest at 
its base, narrowing forward to its apex, where it is of the same width as the head. 
The third and fourth segments are slightly longer and wider than the second, and 
niuch longer than the following ones, which arc about equal to each other, the 
apical one being narrowed, of a tubular conic form and two-jointed. The body is 
quite convex above and beneath. The legs and antenna; are much like those of the 
perfect insects, except that they are shorter. Tho two minute joints at the end of 
the antenna; (see figure /) can commonly be perceived in the larva state of these 
organs. 
