Tipidoidea 371 



keeping the jar at a moderately low temperature, 12 ° to 20 C. A 10% to 

 15% solution of cane sugar, or honey, or the juices pressed from over- 

 ripe fruit may be fed in small saturated pellets of filter paper or from a 

 drinking fountain made by closing the upper end of a short length of 

 small glass tubing. 



Although the females of a number of species will oviposit in or on wet 

 filter paper, others require a layer or clump of the same or similar ma- 

 terial that is utilized in nature. The species that will oviposit on filter 

 paper will oviposit more freely in a more natural medium. If mud or silt 

 is required, it is convenient to provide a layer several millimeters deep of 

 fine silt that has been washed through a sieve fine enough to retain 

 the eggs (a mesh with openings about 0.25 mm.). The eggs may then 

 be secured readily by washing the silt again through the sieve. Species 

 that oviposit in algae and mosses, on wet rocks or elsewhere, will usually 

 oviposit freely in tufts or "ropes" of filamentous algae, about the size of 

 a lead pencil, coiled about on the wet filter paper. A considerable num- 

 ber of species that normally oviposit in wet rotten wood, fungi, silt, or 

 algae, oviposit freely in a stratum of rather soft agar, where the eggs 

 are easily seen and from which they are readily removed. 



When adults are scarce one male may be mated with two or three 

 females in succession. If males are plentiful this practice is not advis- 

 able for, in a number of instances and in several species, a considerable 

 proportion of the eggs of the 2nd and 3rd females were infertile. 



GROUP I. IMMATURE STAGES INHABITING ROTTEN WOOD AND FUNGI 



Representative genera, subgenera, or species: Rotting hardwoods (feed- 

 ing mainly on mycelia) — Atarba, Elephantomyia, Epiphragma, Gno- 

 phomyia, Limonia (Rhipidia) fidelis, Orimarga (Diotrepha) mirabilis, 

 Teucholabis complexa, Tipula trivittata. 



Rotting wood and fungi — Limonia (Limonia) cinctipes, L. (L.) rara. 



Fungi — Limonia (L.) globithorax, L. (L.) macateei, Via. 



Rotten wood- and fungus-inhabiting forms are probably the easiest 

 of all craneflies to rear and may, in many instances, be carried through 

 repeated generations within the breeding cage. Since any sample of 

 rotting wood or fungus in which larvae and pupae are found may contain 

 the immature stages of still other species (as well as possible predators), 

 if one wishes to culture but a single species it is necessary to sterilize the 

 habitat material for arthropods without destroying the microfungus or 

 algal flora. This is best done by air drying. Part of the material is 

 dried for several days or weeks, while the possibly mixed culture is kept 

 alive in another portion. The dried material may then be placed on 

 pads of wet filter paper or on a layer of wet sand in the rearing jars 

 where it will become re-saturated with moisture within two or three days ; 



