486 Report of the Department of Entomology of the 



terous insect were detected. The discovery of twenty-eight recogniz- 

 able pygidia in the crop of one individual shows that this species, 

 like niveus, may feed extensively on certain kinds of scale insects. 



OVIPOSITION. 



The female usually selects a small branch of about a half or third 

 of an inch in diameter in which to place her eggs. She drills into the 

 thick, wrinkled places in the bark where the small twigs branch. 

 The details of the various operations in connection with egg-laying 

 are, with a few exceptions, as described under niveus. We have 

 not observed this species using a drop of excrement to seal the hole in 

 the bark after the deposition of the egg. For this purpose she bites 

 off particles of bark near the puncture and pushes them into the hole, 

 making a little round pellet. It sometimes happens that the female 

 does not completely remove the ovipositor after laying the first egg 

 but starts to drill another hole in a slightly different direction and 

 deposits a second egg without appreciably changing her original 

 position. (Fig. 33, a.) From examinations of a large number of egg 

 punctures in orchards about Geneva we have found only a few paired 

 eggs, and our caged crickets from this section laid very few eggs in 

 this manner. Apple branches from West Virginia and Kentucky con- 

 tained large numbers of these double punctures (Plate XXXIII) 

 as well as single ones, and live, caged specimens of this species 

 sent to us from Kentucky deposited fully half their eggs in pairs. 

 This slight difference in habit between individuals of this species 

 living in New York and those collected in West Virginia and Ken- 

 tucky seems to be merely a physiological variation and is apparently 

 not accompanied by any deviation of importance either in structure 

 or coloration of the nymphs or adults. 



ECONOMIC IMPORTANCE. 



This insect has habits quite similar to the foregoing species and 

 ranks with it in economic importance. In his studies of the two 

 species in Kentucky, Garman 1 states that angustipennis was the more 

 common in cutting fruit of peaches, plums and grapes. (Plate 

 XXXVI, fig. 2.) A serious result of the rupturing of the skins of 

 these different fruits was the development in the wounds of such 



1 H. Garman. Ky. Agr. Exp. Sta. Bui. 116. 



