16 
dark red in color, tinged partly with blackish. The prothorax 
is not applied closely to the hinder part of the body, being con¬ 
nected with it by a short peduncle. The fore legs are very thick 
and strong, and the fore tibiae strongly toothed. In the "row of 
spines on the outer edge of the middle tibia, is one of double 
thickness near the tip of the tibia. The prothorax and wing- 
covers are parallel-sided, the former squarish, the latter suddenly 
rounded off at tip, and with punctured striae. 
3. Injuries by footless maggots , which bury themselves in the 
seed grain. 
Two rather common injuries to seed corn in the ground are due 
to small white maggots without legs, one apparently headless, 
with much the form and general appearance of a. very small blow¬ 
fly larva, and the other with a smooth, conspicuous head of a shin¬ 
ing jet black color. The first is known as the seed-corn maggot, 
and infests corn only, as at present understood ; and the second is 
black-headed grass maggot, normally a grass insect, as its the 
name implies, and injurious to corn only when this follows 
grass. Both these maggots penetrate the kernel, feeding on the 
mealy inner part, and leaving the outer shell. The first changes 
in the course of the summer to a small two-winged fly of the 
general form of the house-fly, and the second becomes a slen¬ 
der, small black gnat, roughly resembling the mosquito. The 
fly of the seed-corn maggot is little likely to be noticed in its 
winged state, but the gnat of the grass maggot is frequently 
seen in very large numbers on and near the ground in early 
spring. 
The Seed-Cokn Maggot. 
(Anthomyia zeae, Riley.) 
(Plate II., Fig. 6 and 7; and Plate III., Fig. 1 and 2.) 
This maggot penetrates the grain commonly after it sprouts 
but before it appears above ground, killing the germ or the 
growing shoot and finally hollowing out the interior so as to 
leave only the harder, outer parts of the kernel. In specimens 
of injured seed received by us from Altamont, Illinois, the larva 
had boied a round hole in the grain near the edge, and mined 
in a circular direction around the germ. In other grains it had 
entered at the tip of the germ, and in some beside the sprout. 
In one plant containing a full-grown maggot about two thirds 
imbedded in the kernel, a root about three inches long had 
formed, and a yellowish stalk had grown two inches in height. 
Still other grains had almost the whole interior eaten out. Un¬ 
sprouted kernels, softened by lying in the earth, are also fre¬ 
quently penetrated in a way to destroy the germ. Commonly 
these injuries are trivial in amount, but in at least one instance 
mentioned by Dr. Riley in his First Report as State Entomolo¬ 
gist of Missouri (p. 154), the crop of a field in New Jersey was 
practically destroyed. 
