THE CANADIAN ENTOMOLOGIST. 17'.' 



these to the growing tree. There, however, appears plenty of sap to 

 support the larvae till full grown. The only trouble, having got the larvae, 

 is to prevent drying up till time of emergence. 



S. ichneumoniformh. I have never bred and have only taken it very 

 sparingly by sweeping the herbage along the edge of cliff at Eastbourne 

 and Ramsgate. The most 1 ever took in a day was five. 



S. sphegiformis (one of our rarest ones, which is taken every year), 

 has to be cut out of the alder. About March we take train for Three- 

 Bridges Station, thirty miles out on the Brighton line. Arriving there we 

 are soon on the ground and examining the alder stems from one to 

 four inches thick. When we find workings which would denote larvie in 

 the second year, we saw off just below and then again about eighteen 

 inches higher, and if very lucky we may get from ten to thirty sticks in a 

 day. These have to be kept on moist moss in tin boxes till the middle 

 of June, when the moth appears. Having a nice ? quite fresh, we are 

 off by the first train, and having put her in a collar box with muslin on 

 each side, we nang it to a bough and sit down and wait events. Perhaps 

 nothing for the first half hour, but what is that buzzing in front of the box? 

 We get up quic'-ly and see it is a fine o* • We need no net; he is so in- 

 tent that we hold our bottle just behind him and bottle him on the wing. 

 By this means I took twenty-three in one day. The curious part is, I 

 never saw them coming until they were quite at the box hovering, and 

 also that an insect so quick on the wing should not fly off, even when the 

 bottle is as it were all round it and only the cork to put on. 



S. scoliaeformis was taken out of birch fairly commonly at Llangollen, 

 Wales, some twenty years back, but was quite worked out then, and for 

 some fifteen years no one had taken it. However, last year in Scotland 

 I hear it has been taken fairly commonly. 



S. philantiformis was added to our list only some ten years back. It 

 was found by accident feeding in the common thrift on the sea coast in 

 the west of England, but I have never taken it. 



■S. vespiformis and S andreuiformis, the two remaining of our smaller 

 Sesiiadce, are of the greatest rarity, and have only been taken singly. 



Regarding Tipuliformis, in 1874 and 1875 I took and saw several in 

 Mr. B. Gibb's garden, St. Catharine street, Montreal, among the currant 

 bushes, and I should think it would be found in any of our old town 

 gardens now. 



Lachlan Gieb. 



