PROCEEDINGS OF THE 



ENTOMOLOGICAL SOCIETY or WASHINGTON 



VOL. 20 JUNE, 1918 No. 6 



THREE HUNDRED AND FOURTEENTH MEETING, JUNE 6, 1918. 



NOTES ON GADFLIES IN THE FLORIDA EVERGLADES. 



BY C. A. HOSIER, 

 Warden, Royal Palm State Park, Dade County, Fla. 



AND 



T. E. SNYDER, 

 llnre.au of Entomology. 



Two figures are slowly moving along a path in a dense hammock 

 in the Lower Everglades of Florida, stopping now and then, tensely 

 listening. It is 4 a.m. 1 and the stars are still shining, especially 

 the bright morning star, but dawn is tinting the east, the faint 

 light outlining the jungle growth overtopped by majestic feathery 

 palms. Suddenly a barred owl, disappointed in a lonely vigil 

 for frogs, begins a dismal hooting; as we approach it flies from a 

 live oak limb. 



Finally a faint buzzing is heard, which gradually increases to 

 a dull roar; thousands of large flies can be seen above the tree tops 

 steadily hovering or suddenly darting to and fro. This is' the 

 early morning flight of the large gadfly Tabanu.* unnricanus 

 Forster. After a short period the loud buzzing gradually dimin- 

 ishes in volume, and only a few low -hovering flies remain. At the 

 end of about fifteen minutes the flight is entirely over for the day. 



This peculiar flight is what we had come out to observe and 

 note. In the early morning light a more hasty return to camp is 

 made. A large bull alligator near his wallow in a slough in the 

 Everglades is loudly roaring enormously swelling up his throat. 

 Birds are beginning to call or sing and now that the excitement is 

 over we can hear and feel other singers mosquitoes (Aedes), 

 deerflies (C/iri/xops) and the yelftnv fly of the Dismal Swamp 

 (Diachlornx fcrrugatus Fab.). 



Soon there will be a glorious sun rise and \ve shall have entered 

 upon another day at Paradise Key. Before the heat of the sun 

 has become intense, one can start across the saw-grass prairies to 



1 Central time (not cl tylight saving time, i 



115 



