If you do not recognize the insect, send specimens to your State entomologist, agricultural experiment station, the entomology department of a university, or the Bureau of Entomology and Plant Quarantine, Washington 25, D. C. Send several specimens if you can. Kill or stun them with a fly spray if you can't catch them easily. Put them in a small bottle or vial of 70 percent alcohol or rubbing alcohol. You can pick up tiny insects with a moistened camel's-hair brush or on the damp tip of a small twisted paper swab and transfer them to the vial. Pack this vial in a small box so it does not get broken in shipping. If you just place insects in an envelope, they are likely to dry up and be crushed in the mail beyond the point of recognition even by an expert. Be sure to enclose your name and address. It will help to write, request an identification of the insects, and send any information you can about where the insects were, their abundance, a description of the damage, or any other details that seem important. Most of the places named can send you bulletins on at least the major pests, in which you will find control recommendations and answers to many of the questions you might ask.

After you know what kind of insect you are dealing with you will know or can find out what it feeds on, where it lives or hides, and what its habits are. Then you may have to seek out the source of the infestation and destroy the food supply of such insects as fruit flies. Or you may have to correct a faulty condition which is responsible for a termite infestation. If the insects are ants rather than termites, you would decide to use an insecticide. If an insecticide is required, you will be able to decide which insecticide to use, whether a powder or liquid, and if liquid, whether to apply it as a space spray, aerosol spray, contact spray, or residual spray. You will select the type of equipment according to the form of insecticide and where it is to be applied. And most important of all, you will decide where to apply the insecticide to be most effective against this particular pest. Remember that proper application of a moderately effective insecticide will give better results than poor application of the best of insecticides.

ROACHES can be controlled effectively in homes with a spray containing 2 percent of chlordane. It is important to apply the spray in places where the roaches hide or live.

American and oriental cockroaches live primarily in warm, moist locations, as in steam tunnels, boiler rooms, storerooms, basements, and under unexcavated parts of buildings. During warm weather they may also live under porches, around foundations, or in outbuildings.

German cockroaches live right in or near the places where you find them, usually in the kitchen or bathroom. Brown-banded roaches live in these places and also all over the house. You may find them in furniture, closets, or other protected places.

When insecticides are being applied in the kitchen, precautions should be taken not to contaminate food, dishes, or utensils. Such things should be removed from cabinets or shelves before spraying into the surrounding cracks or hiding places of roaches. If it is necessary to spray close to food or utensils, one of the less toxic insecticides those that contain various combinations of pyrethrum, synergist, or rotenone should be used. Such sprays will have to be used more frequently than chlordane sprays.

PANTRY PESTS include several kinds of weevils, beetles, and moths that infest flour, meal, cereals, spices, and other dry foods in the home. When they cause trouble, find the infested products and destroy them. Clean the shelves thoroughly and spray the surfaces inside the storage area with 5 percent DDT. You can destroy all stages of these insects by heating most dry foods in the oven for one-half hour at 140 F. Store uninfected or heat- treated foods in containers with tightfitting covers.

SILVERFISH live in bookcases, around closet shelves, and behind baseboards and window or door frames. In the summer they may be in storage attics where books and papers are present. In the winter they may be in a warm furnace room. Silverfish feed on starchy materials, wallpaper, paper, and books. They sometimes cause serious damage to rayon.

A 10 percent DDT powder can be applied in the cracks and in places where a dust deposit is not objectionable. In other places, or on surfaces where the dust would not adhere, a 5 percent DDT spray should be applied.

The carpenter ant constructs extensive galleries in dead wood where it rears its young. Here are shown large and small neuter workers, a winged male, and an apterous egg-laying female.

ANTS are usually best controlled with chlordane insecticides. Treat the nest if you can locate it with 5-percent powder or 2-percent spray applied into and around the opening of the nest. If ants are getting into the house from outside, they can usually be kept out by spraying porch landings, building supports, foundations, or the sides of the house up to the window level. If the ants are of the kind that nest within the partitions or other places in the house, it is usually impossible to locate the nest. Apply a 2 percent chlordane spray into the openings from which these ants emerge, and onto surfaces immediately surrounding the openings.

CLOTHES MOTH larvae feed on articles that contain wool, mohair, feathers, down, fur, or hair. They usually spend all their time right on the article upon which they are feeding.

Good housekeeping will help control clothes moths by disturbing or killing them and by removing waste material and lint upon which they might feed. Closet walls and shelves should be sprayed once or twice a year with 5 percent DDT. Moths or larvae that crawl over the treated surfaces will be killed. Aerosols or household fly sprays will kill the moths or exposed larvae that are hit with the spray. They have little or no lasting effect, however, and should be used at frequent intervals if they are to be of much value.

Woolen articles such as clothing, blankets, rugs, or furniture upholstery can be protected from clothes moth damage by treating them with a spray containing 5 percent of DDT or methoxychlor. Silicofluoride solutions also give good protection and can be bought in stores under such names as Berlou, Guardex, Larvex, PermaMoth, Per-mo, and Ya-De.

If articles to be stored are not moth-proofed, they should be put in a tight container with paradichlorobenzene crystals or naphthalene flakes. A pound of crystals or flakes is enough for a trunk and they should be scattered through the stored material. If a tight closet can be set aside for storage, use 1 pound of crystals or flakes for each 100 cubic feet of space. Expose them in a shallow pan or muslin bag near the top of the closet. Seal the door shut with masking tape or gummed paper and leave it shut except when necessary to enter.