218 THE CANADIAN ENTOMOLOGIST 



depth of eighteen to thirty inches. Always these holes were in the red soil. 

 Suddenly I realized why I found so many holes in this red soil dug by foxes: 

 "Mrs. Pleocoma" undoubtedly made a fine part of "Mr. Fox's" meal. 



Many times I had caught the males of this species, a black, shiny beptle 

 about one-half the size of the female, flying in the dusk during a slight drizzle. 

 The females seldom if ever come out of the ground, the males only during 

 the winter months or wet season. At such times the air was full of them, ap- 

 pearing like swarms of bees. But let the drizzle stop or let it actually begin 

 to rain and, presto! they were gone. They only fly in the winter months after 

 the first few soaking rains. This general habit of flying only in the winter and 

 during a fine drizzle at dusk is common not only to Pleocoma fimbriata but to 

 Pleocoma behrensii, Lee. and to Pleocoma hoppingi Fall, and probably to all the 

 Pleocomas. 



The underground life is all around us, but few of us know anything about 

 it. We have eyes but we do not see. 



ALBERTAN COLEOPTERA. 



BY F. S. CARR, 

 Edmonton, Alberta. 



Cicindela repanda edmontonensis, new variety. 



Type to be deposited in the National Collection at Ottawa, labeled Edmon- 

 ton, Alta. 2\ — VIII — 19; F. S. Carr, collector; female. 



Length 12.75 mm. The colour is dark brown with narrow elytral markings; 

 the humeral and apical lunules are widely separated from the side margin, the 

 dot of the oblique line being broken off that line. The humeral angles of the 

 thorax are cupreous and the sulci blue, the blue fading out where the sulci join 

 the median line. The under surface of the thorax is bright cupreous and of 

 the abdomen shining green, the under surface being covered with long white 

 pubescence. 



The head is much narrower than the thorax, coarsely strigose, and with 

 the front sparsely hairy. The elytra are punctate, each puncture having a 

 shining granule. 



This variety is another in that complex centering about repanda Dej., 

 a complex characterized by a development of colour pattern along two directions. 

 In one the elytral markings become heavier and more crowded, producing bucolica 

 Csy. and unijuncta Csy.; in the other the markings become fainter, producing 

 edmontonensis Carr and hudsonica Csy. All five varieties have been taken on 

 the banks of the Saskatchewan River at Edmonton, bucolica and unijuncta 

 being the most abundant. 



Diplochila undulata, new species. 



Type to be deposited in the National Collection at Ottawa, labeled 10-\'-19, 

 Edmonton, Alta.; collected by F. S. Carr; male. 



The head is black, the palpi and antennae piceous, the palpi being testaceous 

 at the ends. The thorax is much wider than long, wider at the base than at 

 the apex, widest at the anterior third. The posterior angles are obtuse, the 

 basal impressions single, deep, linear, the median impression defined medially 

 but obsolete antoriorh' and posteriorly. The thorax is smooth. The elytra 



October, 1020 



