124 ENTOMOLOGICAL NEWS. [May 



COLLECTING ON BISCAYNE BAY. 



BY ANNIE TRUMBULL SLOSSON. 

 ( Continued from page 94.) 



But there are other collecting grounds besides the deserted camp. 

 I spend many hours along the shore of the bay. There are several 

 accessible stretches of sandy beach whei-e at low tide 1 find some in- 

 teresting things. Under wet seaweed or beneath bits of coral rock or 

 pieces of wood are many beetles, some very rare ones. But it is not 

 easy to discover or to capture them, for there are so many other liv- 

 ing creatures to distract the eye and mind. As one turns over a 

 heap of seaweed, hundreds of small shrimplike crustaceans, " sand 

 flees" as they are called jump and wriffgle about in a bewildering 

 way. As they strike the sand there is a pattering sound as of rain 

 drops. Then large brown shining ear wigs glide rapidly out from 

 under the seaweed, looking much like big Staphyltmdce, or slender 

 Carabs. Pinkish earthworms crawl sluggishly along, tiny ants run 

 on the sand, and occasionally an immature cricket, soft and pallid, 

 hops up. All this movement and life is at first distracting, but 

 the trained eye soon learns how to distinguish reidily what it seeks. 

 Platynus fl,oriden,sis,& graceful Carab of greenish black runs swiftly 

 out, Bembfdni.m const rictum darts from the heap of seaweed and 

 Ardistomis obliqua with its two bright red oblique spots steals out 

 more slowly. Here too I always find Tachys capax, a tiny beetle 

 of shining black, with pale legs and antennae, and Anthicus vicinos, 

 more slender and graceful. I have taken lie re also LoxaiK/rus fior- 

 ideusis. L. celer, Oodes lecontei, Dyschirius hcemorrhoidaUs. Chin ' 

 ni'tt-s en'ctirnciitctns, Ardistomis schaumif, Att-cenius Icognatus, A. 

 yracilis, and several others. There are also many Staphyliuids. the 

 most common one being the little Bltdhts basalts which is always 

 running over the white sand. Philonthns a turn mis isalso plentiful, 

 while there are two or three species of /Stenus and at least two of 

 fhinius. When tired and stiff with sitting on the damp sand I 

 change my position, take my net and going to the sandy stretch a 

 little farther from the water I chase tiger-beetles, flies, and aquatic 

 .bugs. There are two or three species of tialda which fly over the 

 sand, one of them very pale in color, almost white and very diffi- 

 cult to detect on the white sand. Ii. diptera there are some very 

 pretty Dollchopodidae, most of them of whitish green, to harmonize 

 with the tints of the shore, an occasional robber fly and Borhums 

 renaficits by thousands. I find also on the damp sand a species of 

 the little three-toed cricket, Tridactylus, looking like a miniature 

 mole-ericket. It is very agile and hard to capture. Still farther 

 back from the water and on higher ground grow many flowers. and 

 there I hunt bees, wasps, butterflies and bugs till time to wend my 

 way homeward over the glaring white, hot coral road. 



