OF WASHINGTON. 497 



Howard, 1336 3<Dth st. N. W. President Gill occupied the chair. 

 Those present were Messrs. Schwarz, Gill, Stiles, Howard, Mar- 

 latt, Chittenden, Benton, Ashmead, Pergande, Cook, Johnson, 

 Busck, Fox, Mann, Patten, Waite, Morris, Judd, Hay, Swingle, 

 Chapin, Heidemann, Caudell, Kotinsky, Jones, and Currie ; also 

 the following visitors : Messrs. Gould, Jared Smith, Barber, 

 Taylor, Ulke, and Simonds. 



Mr. R. S. Clifton was elected an active member in the so 

 ciety. 



The corresponding secretary read the following paper by Mr. 

 Pergande : 



THE ANT-DECAPITATING FLY. 

 By THEODORE PERGANDE. 



For many years past, when rambling about the woods sur 

 rounding the city of Washington, I frequently came across larger 

 or smaller colonies of the so-called carpenter ant ( Camponotus 

 pennsylvanicus De Geer), the largest and most powerful of our 

 indigenous ants, which, as a rule, prefers to select for its home, 

 dead, or partially decayed, forest trees, stumps, and logs in which 

 it excavates cavities of various sizes and shapes, for the purpose 

 of having a congenial home and safe dormitories for its progeny. 

 Frequently, on finding such a colony, I watched them excavating 

 new chambers, the detached chips of which were either carried 

 patiently to the base of the tree or stump, or simply dropped to 

 the ground. In watching this work and seeing the chips dropped 

 or deposited, I frequently noticed around the base of the tree, 

 stump, etc., numbers of heads of this ant strewn about, which 

 always aroused my curiosity as to the cause of this strange phe 

 nomenon. Thinking, however, that the ants to which these heads 

 belonged had succumbed to disease or old age while in the colony, 

 and that their earthly remains had been disposed of in this simple 

 manner, I dropped the subject entirely. Recently, however, this 

 subject of heads without bodies flashed suddenly on my mind, 

 while in the woods near Cabin John Bridge, Md., on the 5th of 

 September, 1900, after concluding some observations on certain 

 insects inhabiting the witchhazels and birches at the edge of the 

 small creek at the bottom of the little valley. I ascended the 

 steep and wooded slope for the homeward trip ; getting tired and 

 out of breath when about two-thirds up the hill, I stopped to ac 

 cumulate enough steam or lung power to enable me to gain the 

 crest of the slope. While standing there to readjust my respira 

 tory organism, I happened to be near a beech tree, which in this 

 locality abounds. Casually looking over the smooth trunk I ob- 



