Corn thrips. 
29 
the annoyance they cause in hot weather by settling on the face, where 
they twist in all directions, holding on by their bladder-tipped feet, 
whence they take their German name of “ Bladder-foot.” 
With the help of a magnifying-glass the insect will be seen to be 
long and narrow, and furnished with three pairs of jointed legs. 
Throughout their different stages the Thrips are almost exactly alike 
in shape, excepting that the female has two pairs of long, narrow, 
fringed wings. The male is wingless. 
1—4, Thrips cerealium ; 5—8, T. minutissima. 
1—4, Corn Thrips (female), nat. size and magnified; 5—8, Potato Thrips, 
nat. size and magnified. 
The colour of the Corn Thrips is deep yellow in the first stage, 
paler in the second or pupa-state, and black or pitchy when perfect. 
The above figure shows the female Corn Thrips at rest, and in the act 
of flying; and the figure of the Potato Thrips is added to show the 
difference in shape of the wingless condition. 
The Corn Thrips lays its eggs on Wheat, Oats, and generally on 
Corn and Grasses, and the insects may befound as early as June in 
the ears, and also in the sheathing-leaves of the stem. The injury is 
caused by the Thrip drawing away the juices by its sucker-like jaw- 
apparatus, and thus the grain shrivels and becomes abortive. 
In the case of Oats, I think the amount of mischief done has not 
been fully worked out, for in 1883 I received specimens of Oats which 
were considered to be “ blighted,” that is, the lower part of the head 
was undeveloped, though there was no obvious cause. In 1884, how¬ 
ever, I received specimens from another locality of the same kind of 
attack, with which Thrips were certainly present. I therefore incline 
to think that this failure of the lower portion of the Oat-head is owing 
to the habit recorded in Curtis’s ‘ Farm Insects,’ p. 285, of the Thrips 
attacking the Corn-stem above the knots, and so sucking away the 
juices as to injure the development of the ear. 
On July 21st Mr. D. Byrd forwarded heads of Oats for examination 
