Cjje Canadian ^tttomolojist. 



VOL. IX. LONDON, ONT., DECEMBER, 1877. No. 12 



A FEW COMMON WOOD-BORING BEETLES. 



BY THE REV. C. J. S. BETHUNE, M. A., PORT HOPE, ONT. 



Our Canadian wood-boring beetles, with the exception of a few some- 

 what minute species, belong to the two great families of Buprestidas and 

 Ceranibycidge. These include an immense number of different genera 

 and species ; in Crotch's List of the Coleoptera of North America (north 

 of Mexico) there are enumerated the names of no less than 169 species 

 of the former family and 552 of the latter ; about one-third of these are 

 found in this country. It is evident, then, that to give a bare list of all 

 our Canadian species of wood-borers would occupy no little space, while 

 a detailed description of them, if one were competent for the task, would 

 fill many numbers of this journal. We propose, therefore, on the present 

 occasion to merely give a brief account of the eight species depicted on 

 the accompanying plate. These we have selected on account of their 

 frequent occurrence in almost all parts of the country, and the consequent 

 familiarity of their appearance even to non-Entomologists. Our readers 

 will, we are sure, be pleased with the beauty of the figures, which have 

 been admirably drawn upon stone by Mr. L. Trouvelot, of Cambridge, 

 Massachusetts. 



Taking the species in the order in which they are numbered on the 

 plate, we come first to 



I. Monohammus scutellaius Say — A Pine Borer. — This beetle, which 

 derives its specific name from its conspicuously white scutellum, is of a 

 shining black colour on both the upper and under surfaces, thickly punc- 

 tured with irregular impressions ; on the wing-cases there are, as shown 

 in the figure, a number of scattered whitish spots of various shapes and 

 sizes ; these, on close inspection, are found to be composed of dense 



