ISQ4-] ENTOMOLOGICAL NEWS. 275 



Number of Annual Broods in Harpiphorus maculatus Norton. 



By F. M. WEBSTER. 



The number of annual generations of the strawberry saw-fly, 

 H. maculatus, has been an unsettled question among entomolo- 

 gists for many years. Riley, in his 9th Missouri Report, states 

 positively that there are two broods, one appearing in April and 

 another in June and July. In the Report of U. S. Commissioner 

 of Agriculture for the year 1887, p. 152, the writer recorded the 

 occurrence of larvae, from two-thirds to nearly full grown, on 

 strawberry in Wayne County, Indiana, on Oct. 5, 1887. These 

 larvae were determined as belonging to this species by some of 

 Dr. Riley 's assistants, and furthermore, according to the studies 

 of Mr. Mally, "Insect Life," iii, p. 10, they seemed to agree 

 with others from which Prof. Forbes reared the species now under 

 consideration. I did not, as Mr. Mally states, rear adults from 

 the Indiana larvae, but relied on the determinations received from 

 Washington. A year or so later, on July 3d, in the garden of 

 Hon. E. H. Scott, Mayor of the city of LaPorte, Ind., I saw 

 nearly full grown larvae in numbers sufficient to quite defoliate 

 the strawberry plants on which they were depredating. Not 

 being provided at the time with facilities for studying the insect 

 in confinement, nothing more was done until July, 1893, when 

 being provided with better facilities for this kind of work, I wrote 

 Mr. Scott asking him to kindly send me a lot of larvae. On July 

 5th I received a large number in fine condition, which were at 

 once placed in a breeding-cage on strawberry plants, upon which 

 they finished their development and entered the earth. Nothing 

 more was seen of the insect in any stage until March 19, 1894, 

 when adults appeared in the cage which had been kept all Winter 

 in the insectary, and a few days later were present in considerable 

 numbers. In their old home in the garden at LaPorte, the larvae 

 appeared, simultaneously with, or a little in advance of the ripen- 

 ing of the earliest berries. Though considerably in advance of 

 this, in the insectary, the larvae were on hand at a time exactly 

 corresponding with the development of the fruit, showing that 

 the natural order of things had remained practically unchanged, 

 the insect having only kept pace with the plants, and that, in this 

 case and under the most favorable environment, the species was 

 single brooded. The Wayne County larvae were found at hit. 



