COMMON GRANARY WEEVIL. 
73 
been found perfectly infested,* and in all probability these weevils had 
made their way into the flour from infested corn or granaries or 
stores, in which places they harbour in all available chinks. 
In September I received a box with samples of these same Granary 
Weevils, of which the sender, writing from a farm in the North of 
England, remarked that they “ are a great trouble to me in my 
granary. They attack Wheat while it is in the garners or in bags. 
.... They seem to multiply very quickly and eat all the inside of the 
grain.” 
On the 1st of November I received a note from a correspondent in 
the London district, mentioning that his “ Barley and malt were 
swarming with weevil.” 
A few days later he further noted (with specimens of the beetle 
sent accompanying)—“ There was a large quantity of malt of last 
year’s make which was kept over, as is generally done, in a bin, and 
when it was screened we found it to be simply swarming with weevil. 
This is a very common occurrence, as all know who have to do with 
malt. I have reason to suspect that they were introduced into my 
house by some foreign Barley, as grain-ships often swarm with them.” 
There is no doubt that grain-ships are infested by the Calandra or 
Granary Weevil, as well as our own home stores, and in the notef is 
appended a method of sifting out the weevils and dirt, which might 
with great advantage be much more generally made use of, especially 
if the results of the operation were forthwith destroyed. 
There was formerly an opinion that this weevil left the corn heaps 
in winter. This, however, does not appear to be the case where the 
* I do not give the names of localities of my correspondents on Granary 
Weevil, as, although this attack exists all over the country and has been known as 
injurious here for at least more than fifty years, names of special localities of 
presence might be unpleasant, precisely to those who are doing most to get rid 
of it. 
+ “When the cargo is very badly affected—when the whole bulk seems alive 
as I have myself seen them on very hot summer days—it is a common practice for 
merchants to spout it, i. e., to shoot the grain down a spouted trough, in which at 
the angle is a wire sieve with meshes large enough to let the weevils pass through, 
but not the corn, which runs into the granary or into sacks, as the case may be. By 
such means the quantity of weevils and dust sifted out is enormous; and this 
appliance is generally so situated at the wharves that the beetles are deposited near 
the edge of the wharf or even in the river-bed, and if not naturally washed away at 
high tide are swept into the water, their destruction being thus easily accomplished. 
The great heat generated in a bulk of weevily corn is caused by the dust arising 
from the borings and frass of the insects. The weevils themselves are generally to 
be found inside the granaried heap or cargo of corn, unless the weather is very hot, 
when they are especially lively on the outside.”—From ‘ Granary Weevils, S. 
granaria and S. oryzce ,’ by Edward A. Fitch, the ‘ Entomologist ’ for Feb. 1879, 
pp. 42—43. 
