114 ENTOMOLOGICAL NEWS. [April, '05 



which otherwise might have been a fortnight later. In a very 

 short time I had captured a series of seven males and five 

 females of C. bidentatus, but not a single C. annulatus was yet 

 seen. But, still better, I had repeated an observation made 

 seventeen years ago, only not recorded at that time, and which 

 I did not like to record after such a long interval, unless hav- 

 ing made it again. 



All the five females were caught ovipositing, and their man- 

 ner in doing so was peculiar. They took a very nearly verti- 

 cal position, wings, abdomen and all, and flying in this position 

 slowly onward, dipped the points of their abdomens vertically 

 into the crumbled limestone deposit on the bottom of the very 

 shallow Water. It is evident, that the protruding, pointed and 

 very hard ovipositor is wonderfully fit to protect the soft tex- 

 ture of the terminal segments against being injured by the 

 sharp-edged debris. I could not observe, whether the eggs 

 were laid singly or in clumps, not finding any eggs left in the 

 ovipositors of my captives. The operation was otherwise 

 easily observed during some length of time, before it was put 

 an end to by a good stroke of the net. The large and bulky 

 insect in its awkward vertical position made a curious impres- 

 sion of helplessness and was indeed very easily captured.* 



I may here add that the black-and-yellow annular pattern, 

 with the golden green eyes, seemed to me wonderfully adapted 

 for hiding Cordulegasters settled on lively green shrubs in full 

 sunlight. The males often settled, but had I not seen them 

 alighting, it was found impossible to discover them again as 

 long as they rested motionless. A hawking Cordulegaster seen 

 right in front at your eye-level appears as a mixture of black, 

 yellow and golden green that will be very nearly invisible on a 

 background of sunlit meadow or shrub. 



Still another observation on Cordulegaster perhaps merits a 

 short mention. Years ago, in 1891, I caught a fine female 

 of C, bidentatus near Alvaneu in the Orisons. It exhaled an 



[* Two brief records of oviposition by Cordulegaster have been pub- 

 lished in earlier volumes of the NEWS : by Miss Mattie Wadsworth, Vol. 

 XIII, p. 247, October, 1902, and by P. P. Calvert, Vol. XV, p. 316, 

 November, 1904. EDS.] 



