310 NATURAL HISTORY OF ARTHROPODS. 



SUB-OKDEE, I. CKYPTOTETKAMEKA. 



This sub-order includes beetles which have tarsi of four joints, of which one joint 

 remains rudimentary. It contains two families, Coccinellidae and Endomychidae. 



The first of these, COCCINELLIDAE, or lady-birds, are approximately hemi- 

 spherical beetles, mostly with brilliant coloration, generally red, yellow, black, and 

 white, and a pattern usually of spots. Their head and prothorax are short, the abdo- 

 men with five, rarely six, ventral segments. Their legs are short, and project but 

 little from beneath their bodies. The antennae are short, although of eight to eleven 

 joints, usually of eleven. Coccinellid larvae all have a similar general appearance, are 

 often quite prettily colored or clothed with warts and spines, and have three-jointed 

 antennae. Their comparatively active life necessitates good vision, which is provided 

 for by three or four ocelli on each side of the head. The mesothoracic and first eight 

 abdominal segments have stigmata. Pupation takes place upon fences, walls, trunks 



of trees, and leaves, the pupa hanging by its abdomen. The 

 larvae of most species feed upon other insects, chiefly upon scale- 

 insects and plant-lice. The images feed upon plant-lice, other 

 insects and their eggs, pollen and spores of plants, and a few 

 upon leaves of plants. Some species of Coccinellidce are abun- 

 dant on special plants, but usually because those plants harbor 

 the species upon which they preferably feed. While pollen and 

 spores often form a large proportion of the food of lady-birds, 

 the latter generally prefer animal food, and are consequently to 

 FlG> ^haiemta mspl$ ^ e reckoned among useful insects. When rudely handled, lady- 

 birds emit from the joints of their legs a yellow, odorous fluid, 

 which is said to be the blood of the insect emitted through a pore in the joint. 

 The eggs of lady-birds are elongate-oval, yellowish ; they are deposited in groups, 

 without covering, upon leaves and bark. Lady-birds, or lady-bugs, have received, 

 on account of their useful habits and the attention which their pleasant colora- 

 tion has attracted to them, numerous complimentary names in different langua- 

 ges; the Germans generally term them Marienkafer, but sometimes JZugelkafer, 

 Marienwiirmchen, and like terms ; by the French they are called vaches a Dieu, and 

 betes d bon Dieu. Individual colorational variation within the species is carried to its 

 extreme in the Coccinellidae, Harmonia picta, one of our native species, being so vari- 

 able in figuration as to appear oftentimes in the collections of beginners in entomology 

 as several distinct species. 



Genera with numerous small species, which do not generally attract much atten- 

 tion, are Scymnus and Hyperaspis. The larvae of a number of European species of 

 Scymnus devour mites and their eggs, and one species is an enemy to the gall-inhabit- 

 ing form of the grape phylloxera {Phylloxera vastatrix), while two American species 

 are said to destroy chinch-bugs (Ulissus leucopterus). JBrachyacantha ursina is a 

 common small species in America, and is hemispherical, and black with reddish-yellow 

 spots. Hyperaspidius coccidivorus, one of our smallest species, is said by H. G. 

 Hubbard to colonize upon the trunks of orange-trees which are thickly infested with 

 certain scale-insects (Coccidae), and to entirely free them from these pests. There is 

 little doubt that these small species do as much good in destroying insects injurious 

 to plants as do the larger species, but their minuteness has prevented their habits from 

 being carefully observed. 



