(Fig. 120, C) is about one-tenth of an inch long, shining black, with a
metallic sheen. Legs short, feet yellow. Maggot (Fig. 120, A) yellowish
white, about one-eighth of an inch long, cylindrical, and tapering in
front. Usually three generations. 1. The maggots of the first generation
are found during May, in the lower part of the haulm of summer corn
(especially oats and barley); the plants attacked either die off
entirely, or some haulms develop further, remaining small, however, and
yielding only a few light grains. The base of the haulm thickens
abnormally, but the growth in length is always small; the leaves, too,
grow badly, first becoming yellowish at the tip, and then entirely
yellow or reddish. The symptoms of disease are exhibited to a less or
greater extent, according as few or many (even up to ten) maggots
inhabit the base of a plant. The shining brown pupæ (Fig. 120, B) are
found in the lower part of the haulm, or between the leaf-sheath and the
haulm (Fig. 120, D). The adult insect is on the wing at the end of May
and in June. The first generation often appear on wild or meadow
grasses, and are chiefly seen on summer corn when this is sown late or
develops slowly. 2. The maggots of the second generation are found in
average cases during July, on the as yet scarcely ripe grains of late
summer corn, principally those of oats and barley, often occurring also
in the haulms of grasses. They keep between the awns, and suck the
juices of the soft developing grains, which are rendered incapable of
growth, and in any case remain light. The maggots of the second
generation develop more quickly than those of the first or third; they
are mature in three weeks. The pupa rest is very short, and the flies
appear in August, September, or October. They lay their eggs on the
leaves of winter corn or winter grasses, and from these eggs are
developed (3) the maggots of the third generation, which are to be
found, during September and October, in the heart of winter corn and
grasses, injuring these plants in exactly the same way that the maggots
of the first generation injure the summer corn. The insect passes the
winter as a pupa in winter corn plants or grasses. It is but very rarely
that all _three_ generations infest the corn of any particular region;
as a rule, only the first, second, or third generations do this, or the
first _and_ third; in such cases the other generations live on grasses.
_Remedies_: Extermination of the insect is impossible, since it can
always go from corn to grass plants. Oats and barley are almost always
attacked in spring, if in the immediate neighbourhood there is winter
rye inhabited by the maggots, for the flies, when they emerge the next
spring, seek out the summer corn. This may, however, be made impossible,
or at least difficult, if a field of peas, clover, lupines, rape, or
some other crop not of gramineous nature, is interposed between fields
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