SUBFAMILY II. OEDIPODIN.^. 275 



VII. SPHARAGEMON Scudder 1875a, 467. (Gr., "to crackle.") 



Medium sized species, having the body slender, more or less 

 compressed; head somewhat swollen above; vertex shaped much 

 as in Dissostcira, but the sides converging more rapidly, median 

 carina faint or wanting, angled front margin absent, foveohp wid- 

 er and more distinct; frontal costa narrow, sulcate, at least below 

 the ocellus, its margins feebly converging above the antennae and 

 continuous with those of vertex ; antenna? in both sexes about as 

 long as hind femora, filiform, the joints of basal third slightly 

 flattened; pronotum with disk of metazona flat, that of prozoua 

 more or less tectiform ; median carina usually high, strongly com- 

 pressed, cut slightly in front of middle by a deep but narrow 

 notch, that portion on metazona usually more or less arched; 

 lateral carina? usually distinct only on metazona ; lateral lobes as 

 in Dissostcira ; tegmina relatively shorter than in Dissostcii-a, the 

 intercalary vein less distinct and nearer the median than the 

 uluar vein; wings yellow, with a dark curved median band, the 

 outer portion hyaline; hind femora rather stout and short, equall- 

 ing or slightly surpassing the tip of abdomen; hind tibia 1 , in our 

 species, usually with at least the apical half red ; valves of ovi- 

 positor short, but little exserted. 



This genus is so closely related structurally to Dissostcira that 

 Saussure (1884, 135) placed it as a subgenus under that name, 

 though Spharageuion has priority. Both Scudder (1875a) and 

 Morse (1895a) have published revisions of the genus, treating the 

 species known to them at the dates given. All the forms are very 

 closely related, so much so, indeed, that a satisfactory separation 

 of the species is a most perplexing problem to the systematist. 

 Morse considered several of our eastern forms as only geographic 

 races of the older named species, but Scudder evidently did not 

 agree with him for in his catalogue (1900) he failed to list Morse's 

 var. sciidderi either as a variety or synonym, and placed in/oin- 

 ingianum as a distinct species and not as a variety of colhirc. If 

 this omission and placement were intentional and not an over- 

 sight he was, from my viewpoint, not far wrong in his conclusions. 



In regard to the general color of the various forms, Morse 

 (1895a, 288) has well said: "Variation in color in this genus, in 

 common with other Oedipodino 1 , counts for very little; the same 

 species or race may be of all shades from a general dark fuscous to 

 a pale buff or even a bright reddish-brown, even in specimens 

 from the same spot, yet it is probable that the general tint of a 

 large series will be found to agree with the color of the soil of 

 the locality or other peculiarity of environment." 



