OF WASHINGTON. 169 



upon maize. In 1872 I also reared the beetle from pupae found 

 on Croton. We have long known that the imago in this species 

 departed from the normal habits of the family, in that it feeds 

 upon various substances and approaches more nearly in this 

 respect the genus Kpilachna. Its food habits have been pretty 

 well investigated and recorded by Forbes (i2th Illinois Ento 

 mological Report, 1883), and it was found devouring the pollen 

 of Taraxacum densleonis by Mr. Webster (American Entomolo 

 gist, Vol. Ill, 1880, p. 173), while I have recorded its injury 

 to blades of corn and its eating the eggs, larvae and pupae of 

 Lina scripta (American Naturalist, 1881, p. 326). I have also 

 shown in the same periodical for 1883, pp. 322, 323 that the 

 beetles in confinement did not eat various kinds of leaves 

 offered them. They have, however, been found eating into the 

 soft kernels of corn, and quite extensively by Mr. Pergande in 

 some observations he made on corn insects for me. He found 

 both adults and larvae eating into the soft kernels of sugar corn. 

 Mr. Webster has also found both the imago and larvae of Dip- 

 losis tritici and the imago on the wheat blossom. So many 

 insects belonging to genera or families which are essentially 

 plant feeders will also feed upon soft insects and vice versa, that 

 this combined habit in the adult Megilla is not so strange as 

 would at first appear, and there is, so far as I know, no evidence 

 to show that the larva is ever anything else than entomopha- 

 gous. 



The larva of Megilla maculata closely resembles that of M. 

 13-pundata, for which it might easily be mistaken. That of 

 i^-punctata is, however, paler, with black markings of the pro- 

 thorax distinctly bi-lobed posteriorly, whereas in maculata the 

 posterior margin is entire. It also closely resembles the larva 

 of Coccinella bipunctata, the tuberculation and thoracic mark 

 ings of which are almost identical, though the general color is 

 darker, more dingy and without the bright band across the 

 fourth abdominal segment. The larva of C. y-notata is also 

 very similar, but the hairs of the tubercles are distinctly en 

 larged and not simple as in maculata. In the markings of the 

 pro-thorax the larva of maculata is almost identical with that 

 of C. bipunctata. 



Mr. Schwarz remarked that the life histories of our Cocci- 

 nellidae do not seem to present any special features, and the 

 only peculiarity in Megilla maculata that occurred to him was 

 the habit of congregating or huddling together in great num 

 bers under stone, bark, boards, etc. , during cold weather, not 

 only in winter-time, but also in spring and summer. The 



