394 ENTOMOLOGICAL SOCIETY 



the prothorax bears two prominent, recurved, median spines, in 

 development about equal to those on the disc of the prothorax. 

 In the smaller specimens, the probable males, these spines are 

 rudimentary, taking the form of tubercles, or if sharp are much 

 smaller than the regular discal spines. Considerable variation is 

 exhibited even in this small series in the number, development, 

 and arrangement of the discal spines. 



Xylocleptes decipiens Lee. was taken under the bark of 

 hickory (Hicoria], in its galleries, during the last week in Sep 

 tember. A small percentage of the beetles were immature at this 

 time. This discovery, made the past season in Virginia, near 

 Washington, is of interest, since .no record has hitherto been 

 published of its food habits and because our other North Amer 

 ican species included at present in this genus, viz., concinnus 

 Mann, and cucurbitce Lee., have entirely different habits, the 

 former being mentioned by its describer as infesting coniferous 

 trees, the latter, according to LeConte, inhabiting the wild gourd. 



Micracis suturalis Lee., of which Mr. Schwarz informs me 

 Af. aculeatus\^e. is a synonym, the older name representing the 

 male, the latter the female, was described from specimens cut by 

 Dr. Hy. Shimerfrom the prickly ash^Xanthoxylum americanum, 

 (Tr. Am. Ent. Soc., vol. u, p. 164), and a few notes on its 

 habits were published at that time (1. c., p. viii). Dr. John 

 Hamilton also gives some facts in its life-history and records its 

 breeding in hickory ( Can. Ent., vol. xxm,p. 65), and Dr. LeConte 

 mentions its having been found by Mr. Ulke at Washington, D. 

 C., in willow twigs (Tr. Am. Ent. Soc., vol. ix, p. xxii). 



The experience quoted, of finding this Scolytid on trees of three 

 different botanical families, suggests a long list of food-plants. I 

 add the following: red-bud (Cercis canadensis), white ash 

 (fraxinus americana), black locust (Robinia pseudacacid], oak 

 (Quercus spp.), black walnut (Juglans nigra), spice-bush 

 (JLindera benzoin), and Sassafras officinale. 



It is extremely abundant in Cercis, occurring in all parts of the 

 tree except the largest trunks, in wood so old and dry as to be 

 easily crumbled between one's fingers, and in decorticated trunks 

 in just such locations as are most frequented by the wood-boring 

 Ptinidae. Specimens are found most numerous in the smaller 

 limbs that have become dry and sapless. The appearance of such 

 infested wood is evidence that the insects inhabit the same wood 

 for several generations, completely filling it with tunnels, and 

 undermining it somewhat after the manner of Lyctus and 

 Dinoderus. 



This species passes its entire existence from egg to imago in 

 the wood, examination of many infested twigs having failed to 

 show the insect in any stage under the bark. The imago some 

 times, late in the fall, burrows through to the bark, but remains 

 within the wood. 



