DESTRUCTIVE INSECTS

Evening Post, Volume CIX, Issue 119, 22 May 1930, Page 26

DESTRUCTIVE INSECTS

DEATH-WATCH BEETLES

The Church of St. Lawrence Jewry in London was reopened recently aftor workmen had completed the task of restoring the woodwork that had been damaged by hordes of death-watch beetrles, states the "New York Times." These tiny borers are feared for their destructive habits, and they have long been associated with superstitious beliefs. In the quiet of the night, when the hammering of the insect is heard in the home of the European peasant, the sound brings uneasiness because of the primitive .superstition that the nocturnal tattoo presages the death of some. member of the family or of a neighbour. The. death-watch beetle and his numerous cousins belong to the group '.Ptinidae. They do not always choose for their food sucli structures as Sir Christopher Wren's Church of St. Lawrence of Jewry, for old books, furniture, house timbers, drugs, ship's stores, piles of old paper and tobacco arc iueluded in the pest's diet. One member of the family thrives on opium, another feeds on capsicum, and a third has a pronounced weakness for 'dried tobacco. Bibliophiles whoso collections include rare old volumes suffer greatly from the ravages of the death-watch beetle. The insects bore their way sometimes from cover to cover of the most ponderous tomes. They make a meal of tho book paste, and take delight in leather bindings. The rapping noise made by the beetle is caused by the insect striking its head against hollow wood. It sounds somewhat like the drawing of a cork and often can be distinctly heard.