42 
Three specimens of the trim lady-bug (Cycloneda sanguined) had 
eaten plant-lice, pollen of dowers, and spores of the usual kinds; 
but chinch-bugs did not appear in their food. The chinch-bugs 
taken by all these specimens amounted to only eight per cent, of i 
their entire food, and plant-lice to fourteen per cent., the remainder 
being of vegetable origin. Only eighteen specimens from this held 
were dissected, but the contents of their stomachs were of so uni¬ 
form a character that there was every reason to suppose that they 
illustrated correctly the lood of the family at that time and place. 
It would therefore seem possible that these beetles were attracted 
rather by the stores of fungi in the held than by the chinch-bugs 
and plant-lice. 
The condition of the leaves and stalks of the corn, drained and 
deadened by insect depredations, was such as to afford an excellent 
nidus for the development of those fungi which spring up sponta¬ 
neously upon dead and decaying vegetation, and these weie in fact 
extremely abundant. It seems, therefore, probable that whatever 
credit has been heretofore attributed to lady-bugs as enemies of the 
chinch-bug must be greatly diminished, partly on account of their 
preference for fungi, and partly because it is not at ail impossible that 
they were really feeding upon plant-lice, which escaped attention. 
In the autumn of 1864, Dr. Shimer made the additional discovery 
that the chinch-bug was preyed upon by a very common species of 
lace-wing fly ( Chrysopaflorabunda ). These were not quite as abundant 
as the spotted lady-bug among the corn, but still there were so 
many of them that he thought there were one or more to every 
stalk. “Every stroke of the cutter,” he adds, “would raise three or 
four dozen of them, presenting quite an interesting spectacle as they 
staggered along in their awkward, unsteady (light.” . And he not 
only° actually observed the larvae preying very voraciously on the 
chinch-bugs in the field, but he reared great numbers of them to 
the mature fly by feeding them upon chinch-bugs. His account of 
the operations of the larvae when in captivity is so interesting that 
I quote the essential part of it: “I placed one of the larvae in a 
vial, after having captured it in the field in the very act of.devour¬ 
ing chinch-bugs of all sizes, and subsequently introduced into the 
vial a number of chinch-bugs. They had hardly reached the bottom 
before it seized one of the largest ones, pierced it with its long jaws, 
held it almost motionless for about a minute while it was sucking 
the juices from the body of its victim, and then threw down the 
lifeless shell. In this way I saw it destroy, in quick succession, 
about a dozen bugs. Towards the last, as its appetite was becoming 
satiated, it spent five or more minutes in sucking , the juices from 
the body of one bug. After this bountiful repast, it remained mo¬ 
tionless for an hour or more, as if asleep. Never for a single mo¬ 
ment during the feast did it pause in^ the work. When not in 
possession of a bug, it was on the search for, or in pursuit of others. 
Occasionally the chincli-bugs would hasten to escape when pursued, 
as if in some degree conscious of danger.” 
As the lame of these lace-wings are incapable of taking any ex¬ 
cept liquid food, which they imbibe through their tubular mandibles, ; 
there is no question here of the entire correctness of the contu¬ 
sions. I am in fact able to confirm them from our own note-books.] 
