THE CORN OR FLY-WEEVIL.-NO. 2 . 
93 
THE CORN OR FLY-WEEVIL.—No. 2. 
The only sure ground, for defence and protection 
against the ravages of this weevil is, to take advan¬ 
tage of certain conditions of the crops it is liable to 
injure. Thus, the threshing and cleaning of wheat 
early in July, is almost a perfect safeguard ; but if 
left unthreshed till winter or even till September, 
our crops would be nearly ruined. Yet, while this 
and other remedies have been long practised, the 
reasons have neither been known nor sought for, 
and of course have been but partial or accidental in 
their effects. If a few early ears of corn, that have 
been attacked by this insect, when gathered, are put 
away in a dwelling-house, or even in a close box, 
and remain through the next summer, every grain 
will usually be found perforated, and as many dead 
moths lying about, if there is no outlet for their 
escape. Or if a bunch of heads of wheat be taken 
from the field in harvest, and hung up in the house, 
and so remain until October, there will be found 
nearly as great destruction in the grains. 
The most effective restrhiner and destroyer of the 
fly-weevil is cold winter weather. Hence it is not 
known as a serious evil even in Delaware. In 
some parts of Maryland it has been absent for so 
long a time that it is almost forgotten; and then to 
reappear and become for a time very numerous and 
destructive. Their long absence and utter extinc¬ 
tion was doubtless caused by a succession of severe 
winters, and their subsequent return to milder ones, 
which permitted the living of some of the larvae of 
new immigrants coming every summer from the 
south. In lower Virginia, the weevil is almost 
always sufficiently plentiful to be very injurious, if 
not timely guarded against. But even here, the race 
is sometimes so nearly extinguished, that scarcely a 
moth is seen for the next year. In 1832, there was 
no damage observed near my residence in Prince 
George County, even when the wheat was threshed 
so late that the grain would have been nearly 
worthless in other years. The previous winters had 
been unusually cold, and the preceding (1830-31) 
was more severe than any for forty years. Hence, 
there is little to be feared from the ravages of the 
fiy-weevil, in Pennsylvania, and still less in Massa¬ 
chusetts. In both cases mentioned in Dr. Harris’ let¬ 
ter, the infested corn was kept in dwelling-houses 
where artificial warmth served to protect the lives 
of the few lame remaining in the grain during the 
winter, which permitted them to multiply through 
the next summer; for, if there were any weevils 
living in the spring, they could live and propagate 
nearly as well during the summer in Massachusetts 
as in Virginia. Flying moths may be wafted, in sum¬ 
mer, by violent winds, hundreds of miles northward of 
their native and more congenial localities, and even 
may deposit their eggs in regions too far north for 
their progeny to live, except in a few cases where they 
are protected from the cold of winter. The effectual 
protection from weevils, furnished by cold, is not 
at the farmer’s command; but he can often take 
advantage of other means that will prevent any 
considerable loss, and these may briefly be stated as 
follows:— 
1. Corn maybe kept for years nearly exempt 
from the attacks of the weevil by being housed in 
the shuck or husk. I have known it to be thus 
kept through the third year, and much more free 
from injury than shucked corn is in August, and 
even the July succeeding the gathering. ' But this 
mode requires much more house-room and much 
additional labor, if adopted for the whole crop, or 
for that portion designed for sale; still, all required 
for bread at home, after the beginning of summer, 
may be well and ought to be kept in the shuck. 
The reason of exemption from the weevil is obvi¬ 
ous. The few larvae which may be in the corn, 
when housed in autumn, perish, because they are 
not able to escape from the compact bulk ; and the 
same compactness prevents the access of lay¬ 
ing moths approaching from other places. The 
grains exposed by the opening of the shuck, and 
those only of ears at the outside of the bulk, are all 
that can be reached or suffer from the weevils at 
all. 
2. If, instead of keeping the corn in the ear, and 
shucked, as usual, until wanted for food or market, 
it were shelled in May, or before the coming out of 
the first summer broods of weevils, and kept in bins, 
or in bulk, there would be very little damage from 
all the succeeding generations. The first few moths 
would perish by confinement, except those produced 
in grains then on the surface of the bulk; and none 
others could deposit otherwise than on the surface 
of the grains. It is obvious that every change of 
the surface exposes to such injury a new layer of 
grain before untouched; and if left undisturbed, the 
surface grains will serve to shield all below them. 
When the com is about to be sold, the weevil-eaten 
surface of the bulk may mostly be separated by 
strong fanning, or a previous raking off of all the 
surface corn, which may be reserved for stock¬ 
feeding. 
3. Wheat, as soon as reaped, and perhaps sooner, 
is supplied from the granaries with a greater or 
less number of parent weevils 'to lay the earliest 
brood; and if it remains in the straw until Sep¬ 
tember, and when threshed, is left in small bulk, or 
often stirred, nearly all the grains may be weevil- 
eaten ; but if wheat be threshed and well-fanned 
early in July, in this region, there will be no 
weevils worthy of notice. The eggs previously 
layed, probably do not exist on the grains, but on 
the chaff or shuck, in which they are inclosed, and 
in hatching, the maggots must perish for want of 
food. As in the case with corn, the bulk of clean' 
wheat is not exposed to subsequent layings except 
on the grains at the surface of the bulk. Even if 
the eggs had previously been attached to, and had 
remained with, the grains, instead of the chaff, as 
I infer to be the case, and then hatched in the inte¬ 
rior of the bulk, the w r eevils could not escape from 
such close confinement, but w T ould die without in¬ 
crease. 
Seed wheat is usually kept spread out at least ten 
inches thick, in order to avoid any possible heating 
from remaining moisture, and by some farmers is 
frequently stirred, both of which conditions offer a 
greater opportunity for the depredations of these 
insects. Notwithstanding this, it is rare that they 
become numerous. 
4. The bulking of early-threshed wheat, without 
separating the chaff, is also said to be sufficient pro¬ 
tection from the weevil. Of this mode I have no 
