878 MOSQUITOES OF NORTH AMERICA 



Bancroftia Theobald, Mon. Culic, v, 118, 469, 1910. 



Pneumaculex Theobald, Mon. Culic, v, 118, 469, 1910. 



Orthopodomyia Theobald, Mon. Culic, v, 118, 470, 1910. 



Thomasina Newstead & Carter, Ann. Trop. Med. & Par., Ser. T. M., iv, 553, 1911. 



Bancroftia Howard, Dyar & Knab, Mosq. No. & Centr. Amer. & W. Ind., 1, 53, 63, 65, 



70, 74, 93, 94, 95, 144, 184, 1913. 

 Orthopodomyia Edwards, Bull. Ent. Res., iv, 239, 1913. 



The type species are : Of Orthopodomyia Theobald, Orthopodomyia albipes 

 Leicester ; of Bancroftia Lutz, Bancroftia albicosta Lutz ; of Pneumaculex Dyar, 

 Culex signifer Coquillett; of Thomasina Newstead & Carter, Mansonia longir 

 palpis Newstead & Thomas. 



Generic Diagnosis of Adult: 



Proboscis rather long and slender; palpi rather short in the female, long in the 

 male. Antennae slender and filiform in the female, the joints with rather small 

 basal whorls; plumose in the male, the last two joints long and slender, the others 

 short but longer than usual in males, stout, giving the shaft a rigid appearance, 

 with basal whorls of long hairs. Prothoracic lobes remote dorsally. Mesonotum 

 with series of coarse long setae along the sides and fewer upon the disk. Scutellum 

 rather feebly trilobate. Postnotum nude. Abdomen subcylindrical, blunt at the 

 tip in the female, the cerci visible; scarcely expanded in the male, the lateral 

 ciliation slight. Legs long and rather slender, the fourth joint of the front tarsi 

 much shorter than the fifth in both sexes; claws simple in the female, unequal and 

 some of them toothed in the male. 



Geneeic Diagnosis of Larva: 



Head rounded, not particularly widened through the eyes, often a little longer than 

 wide; antennae moderate, smooth, with the tuft before the middle. Abdomen with 

 a series of dorsal plates on the sixth to eighth or seventh and eighth segments, 

 which appear only in the last larval stage. Air tube moderately long, smooth, with- 

 out pecten, a single hair tuft near the middle. Lateral comb of the eighth segment 

 of greatly elongated spines. Anal segment ringed by a chitinous band in the last 

 stage; ventral brush well developed, confined to the barred area. Anal gills generally 

 with the upper pair longer than the lower pair. The skin contains a red pigment. 



Tropical and temperate regions of America; Oriental Eegion. 



The generic status of our species of Orthopodomyia has been in much con- 

 fusion, although the genus is really a well-marked one. Theobald placed 

 signifer, the species first made known, in Stegomyia, being guided by the 

 thoracic ornamentation of the adult. Lutz in 1904 and Dyar in 1905 created 

 new genera for species of this genus. Coquillett, and later Newstead and 

 Thomas, placed one species in Mansonia, being deceived by the shape of the 

 wing-scales. Dyar and Knab placed in Mansoriia all the species found to be 

 congeneric with this species on larval characters, thus completely distorting 

 that genus. The tree-hole inhabiting larvae treated by them as Mansonia belong 

 to Orthopodomyia, whereas the larvae of Mansonia in the proper sense live in 

 marshes of permanent water, attached to the roots of aquatic plants. Dyar and 

 Knab adopted the name Bancroftia for this genus and we have used it in the 

 earlier part of this work, but Edwards has since shown that Orthopodomyia from 

 the Oriental Eegion is the same and apparently has priority. 



The larvae inhabit water in holes in trees, in broken bamboos and at the leaf- 

 bases of Bromeliaceae. The eggs of the species best known are laid singly on the 

 sides of the tree-hole at the edge of the water line, sometimes in rows of two or 

 three or even more. Each is covered by a gelatinous, brown, wrinkled mem- 

 brane, resembling a veil. They hatch in two or three days and the little larvae 

 descend into the brown water which collects in such tree-holes. The adults are 

 attracted to such water for purposes of oviposition. Similar conditions occa- 

 sionally obtain in old water barrels or other similar artificial receptacles, and 

 these are, when suitably situated, occasionally inhabited by the Orthopodomyia 

 larvae. The larval development is not particularly rapid. Hibernation appar- 

 ently occurs in the advanced larval state, in the only species known to occur 



