110 THE CANADIAN ENTOMOLOGIST. 



COLLECTING NOTES ON KANSAS COLEOPTERA.— II. 



BY \V. KNAUS, MCPHERSON, KANSAS. 



The past two seasons in Kansas have proved fairly profitable to the 

 collector of Coleoptera. To the plains collector the " open " season for 

 successful collecting extends from April ist to October 15th. If he is so 

 fortunate as to reside beside or near a wooded stream, his "open" season 

 covers the cycle of the months, as winter sifting proves almost as 

 profitable as collecting during the summer months, especially if he looks 

 after the small things, and he is not possessed of the genuine collector's 

 spirit if he does not look carefully after the minute things in insect life. 



My collecting for the past two seasons has been done principally at 

 McPherson, near Medora, Reno County ; at Rago, Kingman County ; 

 Belvidere, Kiowa County, and at Wallace, in Wallace County; and at 

 each locality something new develops each season. Wallace is always an 

 interesting collecting region, and the collector can count on finding some 

 " good things." Here along the clay bluffs south of the Smoky Hill 

 River, is found during June and July Amblychila cylindriformis, Say, the 

 elephant, in size, of the tiger beetle family. Hidden in holes and burrows 

 during the day, they emerge at nightfall and seek for food, dining off the 

 various insects of the region, and themselves proving a dainty morsel 

 for the predatory skunk. I collected at Wallace on July nth and 12th 

 of this season in company with Nathan Reist, of Lime Rock, Pa., and in 

 two evening's work we were so fortunate as to take eleven specimens of 

 Amblychila* They do not move at all rapidly, but if one emerges from 

 a hole and sees you, it does not take him long to seek protection under 

 ground. In collecting in the semi-darkness you are liable to be deceived 

 by the Buffalo cricket and the slow-moving Tenebrionid, Eleodes 

 longicollis, both of which forage at night. I have never taken Amblychila 

 except at Wallace, but my friend, Claude J. Shirk, found a specimen near 

 the Canadian River, in Hansford County, Texas, the latter part of July. 



Another desirable Cicindelid found at Wallace was Cicindela 

 J>ulclira, Say. Some fifty specimens were taken during two days col- 

 lecting. They were found along and near abandoned or little-travelled 

 roads on the upland and towards the top of the clay bluffs along the 



*Prof. S. W. Williston, of the State University at Lawrence, Kansas, who was one 

 of the original discoverers of this species at Wallace, tells me that in 1877, while collect- 

 ing along these bluffs with his brother, he took as many as a hundred specimens in 

 one night. In recent years, however, they have never been taken in any numbers. 



