STATE AGRICULTURAL SOCIETY. 
75T 
MIDGE. AMERICAN HISTORY. 1880 . IT WHOLLY VANISHES. 
ever been noticed in the history of this insect, took place within 
my observation in the following year, I860. The flies made their 
appearance as usual in June. Reading by lamp light near an open 
window each evening, in order to observe the date of their com¬ 
ing abroad, it was on the 13th of the month this year that the 
first midge was seen alighted upon the paper before me. And 
the weather being oppressively warm and sultry, quite a number 
were noticed upon the two following evenings, in the same situa¬ 
tion, arid also smothered by the heat of the lamp’s chimney and 
lying dead, upon the table around it among a multitude of other 
midges, gnats and other small insects, this species being readily 
distinguished among them by its bright yellow color. The suc¬ 
ceeding evenings were more cool and no more of the flies were 
seen. Not doubting but that they had all gathered into the 
wheat fields and that I should find their progeny there a few 
weeks later, no further notice was given them. 
But, to my surprise, on going to the wheat fields in July, I 
could find none of tho midge’s larva; there. I was quite solici¬ 
tous of obtaining some of these larvae, for further observations 
and experiments, preparatory to writing this account. I had 
never before experienced any difficulty in finding them. Com¬ 
mon as I knew them to have been the year before, I felt confi¬ 
dent that a few of them at least could be found now. But on 
examining the fields in different directions to a distance of four 
and five miles, not a single one could I anywhere discover. Now 
becoming eager to know if other places were similarly exempt, 
as the wheat was ripening and almost ready for tho harvest, I 
made an excursion northward into Vermont to a distance of some 
fifty miles, looking closely at every wheat field along tho road¬ 
side, and plucking and examining the ears of every variety of 
aspect that I could select upon the margin of many of the fields. 
But not one of the yellow larvm could I find, and nowhere could 
a wheat head be seen that was ragged and torn by the yellow 
birds to feed on these larvae therein. The ears of wheat were 
everywhere noticed as being remarkably large, plump and 
smooth ; and wherever it had chanced to be sowed, through all 
this district, such a yield of wheat was this year obtained as 
only persons who were now in the decline of life recollected to 
have been produced on the same farms in their youth. Our local 
newspapers contained frequent notices of the large amount of 
