98 
COLEOPTERA. 
the spring this grub is transformed to a pupa, and in June or 
July it is changed t,o a beetle, and comes out of the branch. 
The history of this insect was first made 
public by Professor Peck,* who called it 
the oak-pruner, or Stenocorus ( Elaphidion ) 
putator (Fig 47). 11 In its adult state it is 
a slender long-horned beetle, of a dull 
brown color, sprinkled with gray spots, 
composed of very short close hairs ; the 
antennae are longer than the body in the males, and equal to 
it in length in the other sex, and the third and fourth joints 
are tipped with a small spine or thorn ; the thorax is barrel- 
shaped, and not spined at the sides ; and the scutel is yellow- 
ish-white. It varies in length from four and a 
half to six tenths of an inch. It lays its eggs 
in July. Each egg is placed close to the axilla 
or joint of a leaf-stalk or of a small twig, near 
1 the extremity of a branch. The grub (Fig 48) 
hatched from it penetrates at that spot to the 
pith, and then continues its course towards the 
body of the tree, devouring the pith, and tliere- 
Fig. 48. 
Larva. 
Fig. 49. by forming a cylindrical burrow, several inches 
Pupa. 
in length, in the centre of the branch. Having 
reached its full size, which it does towards the 
end of the summer, it divides the branch at 
the lower end of its burrow (Fig 49, pupa), 
by gnawing away the wood transversely from 
within, leaving only the ring of bark untouched. 
It then retires backwards, stops up the end 
of its hole, near the transverse section, with 
fibres of the wood, and awaits the fall of the 
branch, which is usually broken off and pre- 
cipitated to the ground by the autumnal winds. 
* Massachusetts Agricultural Repository and Journal, Vol. V., with a plate. 
[U This species was previously described by Fabricius as Stenocorus villosus , 
which specific name must therefore be preserved. — Lec ] 
