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118 
PIN E. 
Pine Beetle. Hylurgus (Hylesinus) piniperda, L. 
1, 2 , Pine shoots pierced by beetles, in section; 3, 4, Pine Beetle, nat. size and 
magnified ; e e, jaws; f g, chin, with feelers, &c. 
The following notes are given with reference to observation of the pre¬ 
sence of the Pine Beetles for breeding purposes in the Larch. 
This beetle has long been known to attack various kinds of Pine, 
as the Weymouth Pine, and the Silver Fir, and most especially the 
Scotch Fir, to which it is often seriously destructive. The life-history 
is for the mother beetle to tunnel a short gallery beneath the bark 
(see fig. p. 114), along each side of which she lays her eggs. The 
legless whitish maggots which hatch from these eggs eat their way 
onwards in, and partly beneath, the lowest layer of the bark, directing 
their course away from the mother gallery; each maggot widening 
its own little tunnel as it proceeds, so as to accommodate its increasing 
size. At the end of their tunnels the maggots turn to pupae, and 
thence to beetles, which pierce their way through the bark and may be 
expected to appear about July or onwards. 
The beetles are of the shape figured above at “ 3 ” and (magnified) 
at “4,” of a pitchy colour when mature, rough, punctured, and hairy, 
and (as shown at “e ” magnified) furnished with strong jaws. 
The great mischief caused by this attack is from the beetles when 
developed flying to the growing trees, especially Scotch Fir, and, after 
piercing into the live shoots, boring a little way along the central pith. 
Thus the shoot is destroyed and the natural growth of the tree altered, 
especially where the leading shoot has been attacked. From the 
pruning or dressings back which they thus inflict on the attacked trees, 
the beetles take their German name of “ Wald-gartner,” equivalent 
to wood or forest gardener. 
For breeding purposes the Pine Beetle selects by preference felled 
or fallen trunks or branches where the sap is not in healthy flow. 
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