THE CANADIAN ENTOMOLOGIST. 143 



Subfamilies of Ontario Gryllid?e. 

 a. Fore tibiie enlarged, fitted for digging ; female without exposed 

 ovipositor (Mole and Sand Crickets) Gryllotalpinse. 



aa. Fore tibiae not enlarged; female with well-developed external ovipositor. 



b. Hind tibite rather stout, armed with stout spines, without teeth 



between them (Ground Crickets) Gryllinas. 



bb. Hind tibipe slender, armed with delicate spines, with minute 

 teeth between them (Tree Crickets) G^canthinse. 



Subfamily Gryllotalpin^. 

 Two genera are represented in Ontario, each with a single species. 



1. Gryllotalpa borealis, Burm. The Northern Mole-Cricket. 



G. borealis, Burm. Handbuch der Ent., H., 1838, 740. 



G. brevipe?inis, Serv. Hist. Nat. des Ins., 1839, 368. 



G. Columbia, Scudd. Mem. Peabody Acad. Sc, i, i86g, 26. 



This insect cannot be mistaken for any other Canadian species. It is 

 a large seal-brown insect, about 30 mm. long, with enormously dilated fore 

 femora and tibiae, the latter with the tarsi forming a sort of hand very like 

 the fore foot of a mole in appearance, and similarly adapted for burrowing. 

 The hind legs are short and not fitted for jumping, and this alone serves 

 to distinguish it from all our other Gryllid^e. 



This species has been taken at Leamington, Essex Co. (Fletcher, An. 

 Rep. Ent. Soc. Ont., 1892, 87), but as I have never met with it in the field, 

 I have nothing to add to the published accounts of its habits. These have 

 been dealt with in a very interesting manner by Dr. Fletcher, under the 

 above reference, and also by Blatchley in his recent work on the Orthop- 

 tera of Indiana. 



2. Tridactylus apicalis, Say. The larger Sand Cricket. 



T. apicalis, Say. Journ. Acad. Nat. Sc. Phil., IV., 1825, 310. 



Xya inixius, Hold. Proc. Acad. Nat. Sc. Phil., VI., 1853, 364. 



Length of body, 9.5 mm.; pronotum, 1.75 mm.; tegmen, 2.7 mm.; 

 hind femur, 4.5 mm. 



This little insect much resembles a diminutive mole-cricket in appear- 

 ance, but differs in having greatly swollen hind femora, and in the fore 

 tibiae, which are much less expanded, and bear three or four spines at the 

 apex. The antennae are extremely short for a cricket, being shorter than 

 the pronotum. The tegmina cover about half the abdomen, and the wings 

 project slightly beyond the tip of the abdomen. 



