1896.] ENTOMOLOGICAL NEWS. 121 



The following papers were read and accepted by the Committee for 

 publication in ENTOMOLOGICAL NEWS : 



THE GENUS OCHTHERA. 



By WILLIAM MORTON WHEELER, Ph.D. 



(University of Chicago.) 



The genus Ochthera is noteworthy in several particulars. It is 

 the most striking, and, probably for that reason, the oldest genus 

 in the family Ephydridae, having been founded by Latreille as 

 early as 1804. The most conspicuous character of the flies of 

 this genus is the peculiar development of the fore legs, which 

 have taken on a raptorial function. The fore coxa is greatly 

 lengthened and thickened and very mobile, the femur enormously 

 enlarged, and the tibia, which is curved and provided with a 

 strong spine at its tip, may be closed up tightly against the bulg- 

 ng face of the femur. This is essentially the same structural 

 modification which is met with in the fore legs of the Mantidae 

 (Orthoptera), Mantispidae (Neuroptera), Nepidae, Belostomidae, 

 Naucoridae (Hemiptera) and in the second maxillipeds of the 

 stomatopod Squilla among the Crustacea. Undoubtedly these 

 are true cases of parallelism, the legs having assumed the same 

 raptorial form under the stress of similar conditions, but inde- 

 pendently in the different orders. 



The genus Ochthera is poorly represented in Europe (two spe- 

 cies) as compared with North America. Besides O. mantis De- 

 geer, which is common to both continents, Loew described 

 (Monog. I, pp. 159-162) three species from this country. Prof. 

 Williston has discovered another species from St. Vincent, W. I.* 

 A description is here given of a sixth species with notes on some 

 of the known forms: 



Ochthera lauta n. sp. $. Length 3.7 mm.; length of wings 3.5 mm. 

 Antennae of the usual form, black; clypeus very small; face very narrow, 

 silvery-white, with scarcely a tinge of yellow; in the middle just below 

 the antennae a shining black, rather low and rounded protuberance, from 

 which a median black groove extends nearly to the clypeus. On either 

 side of this median groove there is a somewhat broader and curved lateral 

 groove, and another of a similar trend running close to the orbit. On 

 either side a series of eight linear black depressions radiates mesially 



* Prof. Williston has generously loaned me his type specimens of this species. I am 

 also indebted to Mr. W. A. Snow for several specimens of ('. mantis from different locali- 

 ties. 



