CERTAIN TAXONOMIC CHARACTERS OF GRYLLUS. 5 



the two forms are simple dimorphs. I have bred both long-winged and 

 short-winged individuals from the same female. 

 Blatchley (1903) says: 



The synonymy of the American species of this genus has become greatly confused, 

 due largely to the fact that foreign writers have attempted to monograph the genus 

 with but a limited number of specimens at hand; and again to the fact that the species, 

 especially the males, are very difficult to separate, Mr. Scudder, in two recent papers,* 

 has in part straightened out this difficulty. However, he, as well as the European 

 writers, has written mainly of specimens collected by others, and has not studied tin- 

 insects in the field. For this reason Mr. Scudder has stated that but o species occur 

 in the northern and central United States east of the Mississippi River. A long scries 

 of observations in the field, coupled with a careful examination of a large number of 

 individuals, have convinced me that at least 6 species occur in Indiana. Of these, 2 

 are believed to be undescribed. 



Let us consider the five native species of these six (an introduced 

 species, domesticus, was included) in the light of considerable field 

 study and also rather large series. I will take up here only two char- 

 actersthe ovipositor and the posterior femora. I am certain that the 

 present opinion of the majority of the students of this genus is that the 

 lengths of these and the relation between them are the important taxo- 

 nomic characters. I have followed out the same line of analysis for 

 the characters considered less important and have reached the same 

 conclusions. Those interested may confirm this for a number of differ- 

 ent characters from the data given in the Appendix. The dimensions 

 given by Blatchley as typical of these 5 species are shown in table 1. 

 They are, I think, generally accepted as describing, as far as they go, 

 the species in question. 



TABLE 1. Typical dimensions of native species. 



Table 2 shows the dimensions of the individuals of the Amherst 

 collection; and, for convenience of reference, the typical dimensions 

 of 4 of the species are indicated. It will be noted that the typical 

 dimensions of arenaceus are realized by 2 of the 114 specimens and 

 approached very closely by 15 others. Americanus, pennsylvanicus, 

 and abbreviatus are just beyond the area of variation. What shall we 

 name the majority of the crickets from Amherst? In the short-winged 



*Psyche, IX, 1901, p. 267, et seq.; 1902, p. 291, et seq. 



