1 66 NORTH AMERICAN BLATTIDAE 



Eurycotis floridana (Walker) (Plate VI, figures ii to 14.) 



1868. Peri planeta floridana Walker, Cat. Blatt. Br. Mus., p. 135. [ 9 : St. John's 



Bluff, east Florida ; North America.] (Pronotum with pale lateral margins, adult.) 

 1868. Periplaneta scmipida Walker, ibid., p. 141. [cT; St. John's Bluff, east 



Florida.] (With pale lateral bands, immature.) 

 1877. Platyzosteria ingens Scudder, Proc. Bost. Soc. Nat. Hist., xix, p. 92. [3 (f, 



I 9 ; Fort Reed, Florida.] (Unicolorous blackish red-brown adults.) 

 1877. Platyzosteria sahalianus Scudder, ibid., p. 93. [2 c? ; Sanford, Florida.] 



(With pale lateral bands, immature.) 



The above synonymy has already been fully established. Mis- 

 conception of the value of presence or absence of pale lateral mark- 

 ings in the present species, and error in supposing immature exam- 

 ples to be adult, caused most of the confusion, Scudder, however, 

 was even more at fault, as Walker's names were evidently ignored, 

 while his comparisions at Vienna with Brunner's "types of opaca'' 

 show an additional error. -^*' 



The present species belongs to the second portion of the genus, 

 which includes the large and heavy species. In linear position, it 

 follows the distinctive E. tibialis and is succeded by E. opaca, to 

 which species it is very closely related. 



The differences from opaca-'^^ may be summed up as follows. 

 Size averaging smaller, form less robust and surface less rough- 

 ened. Coloration not as nearly solid black. '-^- 



This insect shows quite decided size variation, irrespective of 

 geographic influences. In the instars preceding maturity, from 

 about half grown to the last, the pronotum, mesonotum and metano- 

 tum are often conspicuously marked laterad with broad pale yel- 

 lowish bands; these are rarely w^eakly indicated, never pronounced, 



"0 The species was described from a single specimen in the Dohrn Collection at Stettin. 



"1 1865. P[olyzosteria] opaca Brunner, Nouv. Syst. Blatt, p. 216. [c^, Cuba.] 



The comparisons here made are based upon the following material, besides the two 

 adventive females recorded on page 267. 



San Diego de los Banos, Pinar del Rio, Cuba, IV, 22, 1900, (Palmer and Riley), i juv. 

 9 , [U. S. N. M.]. (Incorrectly recorded as E. floridana by Rehn, in 1909.) 



Sancti Spiritus, Santa Clara, Cuba, IV, 1904, (H. A. Pilsbry), i 9 , [A. N. S. P.]. 



Varadero, north coast of Cuba, (J. W. Ross), i cf , [A. N. S. P.]. 



2'2 Additional Cuban material will probably make clear other diagnostic feat ures. The 

 material before us, though showing in every case a distinctly different facics from that 

 developed in floridana, is not sufficient to determine whether or not certain features of 

 possible difference are ascribable to individual variation. 



