THE CANADIAN KNTOMOLOGIST. 135 



fistulosa L., taking over fifty individuals. They almost wholly stripped the 

 mint of its leaves. A few of the larvce were feeding with them — a curi- 

 ous object indeed ; bright yellow, its body depressed, oblong oval, with 

 serrate spinose margins and a long bifurcate caudex turned over its back, 

 reaching nearly to its head. I regret a more minute description can not 

 be given, as I neglected to take any of them at that time, and none could 

 be found when again sought for. This species had not previously been 

 observed here and has not been since. The whole colony was no doubt 

 the progeny of one beetle transported from some more northren region by 

 the Allegheny during the annual spring inundation. They were all taken 

 on a patch of mint not two rods square, none occurring on neighboring 

 patches. With age the elytra become too hardened to pin in the usual 

 way. All taken were of Say's type — namely, pale above with one black 

 spot on the thorax. Mr. Randall, in the Boston Jour. Nat. Hist., vol. 2, 

 p. 30, describes a variety (Cassida helianthi) with three black spots on 

 the thorax and with the elytra in life ■' blackish, irregularly spotted with 

 white," which he found on a species of Heliaiithus. Messrs. Walsh & 

 Riley describe another variety (Cassida ^-punctata) found in Northern 

 Illinois, the food plant of which has also been discovered to be a Heli- 

 a?ithus. Mr. Say mentions still another variety occurring in Mexico of a 

 smaller size and with a transverse, arcuated, black line on the thorax 

 behind the abbreviated one. 



Thus it appears that the species as a whole is very variable as to color 

 ornamentation. It would be interesting to learn whether the races breed 

 true to their types, or whether like Anomala U7idnlata Mels., color varia- 

 tions occur in the same brood. And further, whether each race has a food 

 plant of its own. Perhaps some of your readers living where the species 

 occurs frequently could give the desired information. 



The colony that was found here must have fed on the Monarda of 

 choice rather than of necessity, because three species of Helianthus 

 (decapetalus L., giganteus L., divaricatus L.) grew with it and were not 

 eaten by either larvse or beetle. 



Mr. Riley in his Second Annual Report on the Insects of Missouri, p. 

 59, gives a wood cut of a larva of Ph. ^-punctata W. & R., distended, 

 classifying it with the me[r]digerous larvae. The ones I saw must have 

 been nearly mature and were all clean, their furcate tails turned forward 

 over their backs and not loaded with stercoraceus matter and cast skins, 



