146 



THE CANADIAN ENTOMOLOGIST, 



Head medium sized, rather flat, slightly bilobed, of a pale greenish-white 

 color, with a large patch of black on each lobe above and a smaller one below 

 just above mandibles. Mandibles black, with a streak of white on each. 



Body above pale greenish-white, semi-transparent, with transverse rows of 

 tubercles of the same color, from which arise tufts of long, fine, silky, white 

 hairs. On second segment the hairs overhang the head, and there are here 

 one or two black ones on each side mixed with the white. A dorsal line of 

 pale green ; stigmata pale white, edged very faintly with pale reddish. 



Under surface, feet and prolegs of the same color as upper surface. 



The larva entered the chrysalis state shortly after its capture, and produced 

 the imago on the 11th of June, 18G7. 



ENTOMOLOGICAL GLEANINGS. 



PAPER NO. III. 



BY W. SAUNDERS, LONDON, Ont. 

 THE CURRANT WORM IN TROUBLE. 



On the 21st of July at a quarter past seven in the evening we were passing 

 •around among the currant and gooseberry bushes watching the manipulations 

 of a few of those well known foes, the larva of Nematus ventricosus. The 

 accompanying figure will illustrate their appearance and doings; they were 



feeding away voraciously with 

 perennial appetites, when a dis- 

 turber of their peace appeared 

 among them in the shape of a 

 small black ichneumon tiy which 

 fastened itself on the body of one 

 of their number, and began to 

 deposit its eggs by means of a 

 sharp ovipositor, dexterously 

 thrust through the skin of its 

 victim, whose jerks and writhings 

 while indicating a very uneasy 

 state, failed to shake off the tor- 

 mentor. The fly remained some 

 time attached and so intent was 

 it in fuelling the instincts of its nature that a capture was made of both fly 

 and larva, by the sudden movement of a pill box, but while endeavouring to 

 transfer them to the inside of a tumbler so that their further operations might 

 be better observed, the fly suddenly escaped and was seen no more; the larva 

 also died before reaching maturity, so that its further history could not at that 

 time be developed. 



