OP WASHINGTON, VOLUME XIII, 1911. 171 



MEETING OF MAY 4, 1911. 



The 250th regular meeting of the Society was entertained 

 May 4, 1911, in theSaengerbund Hall, by Mr. Frederick Knab, 

 Vice-president Quaintance presiding, and Messrs. Banks, Bar- 

 ber, Crawford, Dyar, Gahan, Gill, Hopkins, Howard, T. H. 

 Jones, Knab, McAtee, Myers, Rohwer, Sasscer, Sanford, 

 Scott, Viereck, Webb, and Zimmer, members, and Messrs. O. 

 G. Babcock. Heinrich, Snyder, and Tracy, visitors, present. 



The minutes of the previous meeting were read and cor- 

 rected. -T*. 



Dr. Hopkins proposed the name of Mr. )#". E. Snyder, of 

 the Bureau of Entomology, for active membership, and a 

 motion to suspend the rules and instruct the Secretary to cast 

 the affirmative ballot of the Society for Messrs. Cory and 

 Snyder was carried. 



The Society greatly appreciated the extracts from the forth- 

 coming book on the house-fly which were presented by Dr. 

 Howard as the first paper of the evening. A lively discussion 

 followed between Messrs. Quaintance, Hopkins, Banks, Gill, 

 Knab, and Howard, emphasizing the economic importance of the 

 fly question (the estimated annual loss in United States being 

 about $10, 000, 000 pi us perhaps $100, 000, 000 loss in efficiency), 

 the excessive abundance of flies in the temperate regions, and 

 relative scarcity in the tropics (tropical India perhaps being 

 excepted), and their ability to breed in any fermenting organic 

 material. 



-Mr. Banks presented his paper on the tendency towards 

 posterior erythrization in Psammocharidae. 1 This was dis- 

 cussed by Messrs. Quaintance, Howard, Rohwer, Knab, 

 Gahan, Gill, and Banks. 



-Mr. Snyder gave a note on the finding of the true queen 

 of Termes flavipes Kol., 1 and mentioned the finding of other 

 insects among their galleries. Mr. Banks made some brief 

 remarks on the two local species of termites, spoke of the 

 great difficulty in finding the real or supplementary queens, 

 and of some of the differences between them. 



1 Not presented for publication. 



