STATE AGRICULTURAL SOCIETY. 
673 
FIELD FLEA. DESCRIBED. SINGULAR COMBAT. 
This matter makes a kind of scab upon the raw surface of the wound, covering 
it and enabling it to heal. These garden fleas feed upon this scab, thus tear¬ 
ing open the healing wound and causing it to bleed afresh. Hereby the boles 
in the leaf become much larger than when they are first made by the flea- 
beetle, and nature is interfered with and embarrassed in her efforts to recover 
from the injuries done by the flea-beetles and other insects which wound the 
leaves. It is chiefly in this manner, I think, that these little garden fleas are 
detrimental to the plants on which they occur. 
Dusting the infested plants with ashes, sulphur, etc., and most of the other 
remedies which we resort to for expelling the flea-beetles from them, are still 
more efficacious in driving off these garden fleas also. These remedies will be 
more fully treated upon when we come to speak of the flea-beetles, as they are 
insects which it is more important to combat. 
3. Field Flea, Symnthurus arvalis , new species. (Aptera. Poduridae.) 
In May and Juno, sonttered upon the leaves of the pie rhubarb and other garden plants, on 
fruit trees in the orchard, and abundant in fields of clover; a minute soft yellow wingless inseot, 
skipping feebly. 
This species is scarcely half the size of the foregoing one, usually mea¬ 
suring only 0.02 in length. It is of a pale yellow color, commonly tar¬ 
nished or dull yellow, sometimes with a tinge of green, and its head, under¬ 
side and legs whitish. A dusky cloud is frequently seen in the middle of 
the body. It is of an egg-shaped form, almost globular, with the extremity 
of its body protruded as in the Garden Flea, its outline thus having a pro¬ 
jecting angle on each side forward of the tip. The antennae are thread¬ 
like, elbowed, and as long as the body. They are composed of three joints 
only, the last one being compound or made up of ten small joints similar 
to those of the last joint in the Garden Flea, and forming all that portion of 
the antenna which is beyond the elbow. 
In a field of clover, on sweeping over the leaves, the net gathered 
myriads of these insects, so late as the last of June, at which time small 
young ones were greatly in excess of those which were full sized, indica¬ 
ting that they continue much later in the season than I have ever noticed 
them. Upon beating the leaves of apple trees in May and June, several 
of these insects will frequently be found in the net. And it is common to 
see them in the garden, upon the leaves, particularly of the pie rhubarb, 
Rheum Rhaponticum, where these leaves are perforated with holes by the 
flea-beetles. 
On one occasion, when I was endeavoring to inspect the motions and 
operations of these insects with a magnifying glass, I saw two of them 
approaching each other as though they intended to bunt their heads 
together. Though I could not observe their motions so accurately as to 
be certain of the fact, it appeared as though, just as their heads were 
coming together, the smaller one with his antennae grasped the sides of 
the head of the larger one, to break the force of the blow and prevent him¬ 
self from being knocked over by his more powerful antagonist. Instantly 
thereupon, as though to break off the smaller one from his grasp, the larger 
Ag. Trans. QQ 
