HUNGERFORD: AQUATIC HEMIPTERA. 149 



supposed eggs of Corydalus figured in the Am. Entomologist, 1868, really 

 belonged to Belostoma granclis." Weed, while collecting on the edge of a 

 pond near Lansing, Mich., July 3, 1882, found a mass of eggs beneath a 

 board lying at the water's edge. "They looked fresh and beside them was 

 a living B. americanus." In Weed's "Life Histories of American Insects," 

 .1897, he says: "The eggs of the American Belostoma are deposited on 

 pieces of wood or reeds along the margins of ponds, apparently where they 

 will be wet, but generally not directly in the water. They are laid in 

 clusters with from 40 to 60 or more eggs in each. The eggs themselves 

 are' about one-fifth of an inch long, oblong, ovate in form, with the 

 general color brown, spotted with black; they are lighter colored below 

 than above, and there is a whitish crescent near the top with a distinct 

 black spot at its apex. This crescent indicates the margins of a little 

 cap which comes off when the young bugs hatch. Green, 1901, figures 

 and describes eggs of Amargius indicus, and Distant, 1903, egg laying of 

 same species. 



Feeding Habits. There can be no doubt of the fierce predaceousness 

 of these bugs. Marie Merian, 1726, figures the nymph of a giant water 

 bug sucking the juices from a young frog. Weed records that, "In the 

 breeding ponds of the Massachusetts Fish Commissioners these bugs 

 destroyed so many young fish that the authorities had to take special 

 pains to catch and kill them." Matheson in Ento. News, 1907, trans- 

 mits a letter from Philip Lawrence telling of an attack upon a wood- 

 pecker. A woodpecker (an ordinary flicker) was heard to utter cries 

 of distress, and fluttered and fell down out of a tree. A very large bug 

 was found attached to the woodpecker's head. Its beak was inserted in 

 the back part of the woodpecker's head and its legs clamped tightly 

 around the bird's beak. Britton, 1911, records L. americamis as cap- 

 turing a young banded pickerel, Lucius AmeHcanits Gmelin, measuring 

 8% inches long. The writer has found that these bugs will, in the 

 laboratory, make out on pond snails if there be no other fare. 



Behavior. The fact that these bugs are to be taken at the electric 

 lights, sometimes far from water, indicates that they are strong fliers, 

 and that they do their migrating fi-om pond to pond at night. 



DESCRIPTION OF STAGES. 



Egg. Weed gives the egg of L. americanus as about one-fifth inch 

 long, oblong ovate in form, with the general color brown spotted with 

 black, lighter below than above, and a whitish crescent near the top, with 

 a distinct black spot at its apex. 



The writer has captured Lethocerus uhleri and secured egg clusters in 

 the aquarium. One female taken in July laid 4 clusters of eggs one night, 

 7, 7, 6, and 3 in each cluster, the eggs of which were bound together by 

 a clear, gelatinous material. These eggs are figured on plate XVII and 

 from them may be given this description : 



Size. Length, 3.25 mm. to 3.75 mm.; greatest diameter, 1.75 mm. to 

 2.25 mm. 



Shape. Newly laid, irregular ovoid. 



