this region have complained bitterly of a "new long potato bug," alluding to these Cantharides, having forgotten in the midst of the injuries caused by the Colo

rado potato bugs for several years, that these blistering beetles had ever injured potato vines.

The reports coming in from localities all around me were that these Cantharides were much more injurious than the Colorado bugs; that potatoes were greatly injured, and beet crops entirely

Fig. 19.

ruined in many instances; and this accords with my observations about home.

These Cantharides are not very particular about the choice of food. Although they doubtless prefer the potato, beet, golden-rod, etc., yet sooner than be without food, they will devour almost any kind of vegetable that comes in their way. I have seen the Ash-colored Cantharis doing well on locust leaves; also on common red field clover, etc., and have lately, for a wonder, seen the Black Cantharis feasting on the leaves of a common noxious weed, sometimes called lamb's quarters, pig-weed, etc. (Chenopodium album Linn.), for injurious insects are almost sure to eat the useful vegetation in preference to weeds.

After thus observing the workings of nature's plans, I am convinced that she will in due time take care of the Colorado potato bug, as she has of the Cantharides during all past time.

NOTE.-Since communicating the above, I spent two weeks last autumn in travelling in Eastern and Middle Iowa, and learned some facts, the most reliable being developed out of the history of the general good potato crop, as evinced by the price in the digging season. Potatoes at Mount Carroll, Ill., were 50 cents a bushel; at Morseville, Joe Davis County, Ill., 50 cents; at Rock Island, Ill., 60 to 70 cents. In Iowa, at South Amenon, 30 to 35 cents; at Marengo, 50 cents; State Centre, 30 to 35 cents; Grundy County, 25 to 30 cents; and thus prices ranged all along wherever I went. The Colorado potato beetle had been very injurious. AMER. NATURALIST, VOL. III. 13

All through these places for several years farmers all were discouraged with attempting to raise potatoes, and therefore did not plant largely; some abandoned the crop in disgust. The above figures I obtained from parties buying and selling, and learned from them that potatoes were abundant.

I invariably inquired of farmers regarding the Colorado potato beetle. They all knew it very well, but explained the cause of its diminution, by supposing that it had passed by them, travelling north and east; forgetting that insects travel in search of food and breeding grounds, and not to make money, see the country or their friends, or for any other pleasure, as does the human animal. They all knew that the bugs were plenty in the spring, but not in midsummer and autumn. As this peculiar phenomenon in the history of the Colorado potato bug was the same as above noted at my home, I am persuaded that it was due to the same cause, in a slight degree to insect enemies, but chiefly to climatic causes, i. e., the hot dry weather.

I am now convinced beyond a doubt, that the dryness of the summer was the only efficient restraining cause, although my friends Messrs.

Fig. 20.

α

Walsh and Riley differ entirely from this view. See the "American Entomologist," (Vol. I, Nos. 2 and 3) where they figure quite a host of the enemies of the Colorado potato bug, some of which are inserted in the present article, but do not even notice the great climatic enemy that' worked so faithfully and effectually everywhere during the past summer.

Fig. 21.

I appreciate with much gratitude the small part of the work done by these "bug foes," and I hope that the editors and authors will excuse a passing review. Lady-birds doubtless eat the eggs of some potato bug, but many such reports came to my ears through farmers and agriculturists and were not at all reliable. Unfortunately, as I have observed, Lady-birds will devour Lady-bird's eggs about as frequently as any other eggs, and none but entomologists observe the difference, hence I seldom notice such reports, at least in print, without personal investigation. The Many-banded Robber (Har- a pactor cinctus Fabr., Fig. 20) will not do much work, for, although they will eat some larval potato bugs (just as a cat will eat some bread) when hard pressed for food, yet they will perish of hunger when confined in a box with young Colorado potato bugs, as I have demonstrated, thus proving that they must have other and better food. The very same, probably, may be true (reasoning from analogy) of their other principal heteropterous enemy, the Spined Soldier-bug (Arma spinosa Dallas, Fig. 21; a, its beak; c, the beak of the Euschistus punctipes Say, which closely resem

C

bles the Arma). This, however, I never have subjected to the crucial test of boxing up with the beetle, but have never seen it feeding on them in nature, nor found them more abundant in potato patches than elsewhere. The authors, from their correspondents, publish as "no doubt indisputable," that the Blister Beetles frequently feed on potato bugs. This same idea entered my head when I saw the potato bugs so scarce, and the blister beetles, especially the striped one, so very abundant on our potatoes. To test it, I put a few Striped Blister-beetles into a breeding jar, with one small bunch of potato bug eggs (all I could find) and a potato stalk for food. The eggs hatched in a day, and the young Colorado bugs lived in harmony among their "formidable" associates, until the potato vine moulded away. The Blister-beetles perished first, of starvation, without destroying one of the larvæ. This little experiment, although not as extended as I could wish, yet Fig. 22. inclines me to be skeptical about the matter. Their parasitic fly (Fig. 22, Tachina) is entirely new to me, and I hope is a more important enemy than all the others. While I was breeding great numbers of potato bugs in 1865, preparatory to the paper I published in 1866, in the "Practical Entomologist," on this subject, I failed to find anything of this kind here; since then I have not searched for it. Their pa

per is full of interest, yet to the practical man does not give very much substantial encouragement except in recommending the old-fashioned tedious way of picking the bugs by hand, as in reality this is about all man can do.

Before closing this already long note, allow me to place among the list of insect enemies a Philonthus which is undescribed, according to Mr. Walsh, who received the specimen from me. This specimen, in the summer of 1865, I found as an intruder in one of my breeding boxes, containing a number of Colorado potato bug larvæ. When found, it had maliciously killed all the larvæ, just as a weasel or mink will kill more chickens than it needs for food. This insect was a medium sized member of the family Staphylinide, a Brachelytrous beetle. It was black, with short wing-cases. This fierce and powerful insect, individually, is the most terrible enemy of the Colorado potato bug extant among insects, and I hope that some day it will be honored with the name of the Prairie State, with credit for an efficient worker.

NOTE.-Cuts 13, 15, 16, 17, 18, 20, 21 and 22, are from the "American Entomologist."

REVIEWS.

THE PAMPAS AND ANDES.*. - When one considers that this pedestrian feat was performed by Mr. Bishop when only seventeen years old, unaided by influential friends, having no money, and no knowledge of the language, and for a time sustaining himself by his own labor, one must confess an admiration for the boy's pluck. A perusal of the book shows how one will brave a thousand dangers when impelled by a love of nature. Many interesting facts are given regarding the habits of the natives, the physical features of the country, etc. Some errors which have found their way into our text books are corrected. We find, for instance, that no such place as Uraguay is known in South America. The province, incorrectly called Uraguay on our maps, is properly called Banda Oriental. An interesting account is given of a species of marmot, which burrows in the pampas as our prairie-dog does in the West. "Its habits are similar to those of the proper marmots; in size it exceeds the opossum of North America." They are found all over the pampas, as far south as Patagonia. And strangely enough the burrows are occupied by a small owl known by the name of the Burrowing owl of South America. As an account has already been given in the NATURALIST of the Burrowing owl of the West, we subjoin Mr. Bishop's account of the companion species in South America:

"I first met with this owl on the banks of the River San Juan, in the Banda Oriental, one hundred and twenty miles west of Montevideo, where a few pairs were observed devouring mice and insects during the daytime. From the river, travelling westward thirty miles, I did not meet a single individual, but after crossing the Las Vacas, and coming upon a sandy waste covered with scattered trees and low bushes, I again met with several.

"Upon the pampas of the Argentine Republic they are found in great numbers, from a few miles west of Rosario, on the Parana, latitude 32' 56'south, to the vicinity of San Luis, where the pampas end, and a travesía or saline desert commences.

"On these immense plains of grass it lives in company with the bizcacha. The habits of this bird are said to be the same as those of the species that inhabits the holes of the marmots upon the prairies of western North America. But this is not strictly correct, for one writer says of the northern species, we have no evidence that the owl and marmot habitually resort to one burrow;' and Say remarks that they were either common, though unfriendly, residents of the same habitation, or that our owl was the sole occupant of a burrow acquired by the right of conquest.' In this respect they differ from their South American relatives, who live in perfect harmony with the bizcaha, and during the day, while the latter is sleeping, a pair of these birds stand a few inches within the main entrance of the burrow, and at the first strange sound, be it near or distant, they leave their station, and remain outside the hole, or upon the mound which forms the roof of the domicile. When man approaches, both birds mount above him in the air, and keep uttering their alarm note, with irides dilated, until he passes, when they quietly settle down in the grass, or return to their former place.

"While on the pampas, I did not observe these birds taking prey during the daytime, but at sunset the bizeachas and owls leave their holes, and search for food, the young of the former playing about the birds as they alighted near them. They do not associate in companies, there being but one pair to each hole, and at night do not stray far from their homes.

The Pampas and Andes. A Thousand Miles' Walk across South America. By Nathaniel H. Bishop. Lee & Shepard. Boston: 1869. 12mo.

"In describing the North American burrowing owl, a writer says that the species 'suddenly disappears in the early part of August,' and the 'species is strictly diurnal.'

"The Athene canicularia has not these habits. It does not disappear during any part of the year, and it is both nocturnal and diurnal, for though I did not observe it preying by day on the pampas, I noticed that it fed at all hours of the day and night on the north shore of the Plata, in the Banda Oriental."

ONE THOUSAND OBJECTS FOR THE MICROSCOPE.*-This is an exceedingly useful little work for the beginner in microscopy. It has twelve plates of figures, with explanations in the text, and although the figures are none of the best, they are better than the price of the book would seem to justify.

A GUIDE TO THE STUDY OF INSECTS.†-The Fifth part completes the account of the butterflies, and describes the more typical moths, as far as the family of Geometrids. It contains two plates, a full-page illustration, and sixty woodcuts. The "Guide" will contain ten plates, and be completed in five more parts, the tenth part to contain an Entomological Calendar, a Glossary of Entomological terms, and a copious Index.

THE RECORD OF AMERICAN ENTOMOLOGY, 1869.-A sufficient number of subscriptions have been received to warrant its publication, but as the book will be larger than at first thought, the price will be raised to $1.00. Original subscribers at 75 cents, will receive their "Record" without extra charge. (The name has been changed from Annual to Record).

APPLETON'S ILLUSTRATED ALMANAC FOR 1869.‡- A pleasing feature of this annual is twelve cuts, illustrating the game-birds of this country, characteristic of each month.

NATURAL HISTORY MISCELLANY.

BOTANY.

BOTANICAL NOTES. In the autumn of 1867 I collected on the shore of Lake Erie, near North East, Pa., a very marked variety of Scirpus sylvaticus Linn., var. atrovirens?. Instead of spreading rays bearing the heads of spikes, as is usual in this species, the heads of the plants that I found were collected in a dense globular mass, about one inch in diameter. The rays were either very short, or there were none at all. The scales and fruit are similar to those of the common variety. This curious form was not the result of a dwarfing of the plants, for they were of a very robust habit, two to three feet high, with wide leaves and a stout culm. I propose calling it var. sychnocephala if not already named. I found them

• One Thousand Objects for the Microscope. By M. C. Cooke. 12mo. London, 1869. 1s. A Guide to the Study of Insects, and a Treatise on those Injurious and Beneficial to Crops. For the use of Colleges, Farm Schools and Agriculturists. By A. S. Packard, jun. Parts 1-5. 50 cents each. To be published in ten parts. Published by the author, Salem, Mass. Appleton's Illustrated Almanac, 1869. For sale by H. A. Brown & Co., 3 School st., Boston.