SOME OBSERVATIONS ON DERMESTES

Extract

Having read in the Report of the Entomological Society of Ontario for 1877 an article by Prof. J. T. Bell, of London, Ont., entitled “How to Destroy Cabinet Pests,” I thought it might not be unprofitable to record my own observations on Dermestes.

Early in the summer of 1876 I captured four beetles, three males and one female, and placed them in a glass jar with a piece of the meat on which I found them feeding. I observed the female deposit a number of eggs on the meat, but before any were hatched I left home, and was absent about five weeks. On my return I found a large and flourishing colony of larvæ, most of them full grown.