J 



638 FAMILY XXIV. — ANTHOCORID^E. 



membrane whitish-hyaline; antennae yellow, the basal joint blackish; 

 beak, hind tibia? and femora, except at apex, piceous-brown ; remainder 

 of legs brownish-yellow, often in part tinged with fuscous. Middle of 

 front portion of pronotum calloused and nearly 

 smooth, the remainder of disk finely, thickly, ru- 

 gosely punctate. Other structural characters as 

 under generic heading. Length, 1.8 — 2 mm. (Fig. 

 162). 



This is the most common Anthocorid and 

 one of the most common of the Heteroptera 

 found in this country, ranging throughout 

 southern Canada, over almost the entire 

 United States, and south to the West In- 



Fig. 162. X 16. ' 



(Alter Riley). dies, Brazil and Argentina. It lives m or on 

 the heads of various flowers, especially those of Compositse, 

 where it feeds on plant lice and other small, soft-bodied insects 

 and their eggs and larvae. In Indiana the adults are common 

 from about May 10 to December. In Florida I have taken it 

 only at Dunedin, R. P. Park and Lakeland, either by sweeping 

 or beneath boards, but it has been recorded by Barber from 

 Jacksonville, Punta Gorda and several intervening stations. 

 Uhler (1877, 427) says that in Maryland it "is found on the 

 ox-eye daisy and other wild flowers, and in gardens sometimes 

 abounds upon the small fruits, sucking their juices and giving 

 the berries a nauseous taste." It has been recorded by Garman 

 and Jewett (1914) as frequenting young corn ears, where it 

 feeds on the eggs of the corn-ear worm and deposits its own 

 in the strands of corn silk, its injuries made in oviposition fur- 

 nishing a place for entrance for the spores of the disease known 

 as corn-ear rot. As suggested by Champion (1900, 327) and 

 shown by Parshley (1919, 28) the 0. tristicolor (White) is only 

 a color variety of insidiosus in which the clavus is almost wholly 

 black. It is the form usually found in the Pacific states, but 

 occurs sparingly with typical insidiosus throughout the range of 

 the latter in this country. 



616 (— ). Orius pumilio (Champion). 1900, 327. 



Form of insidiosus but distinctly smaller and more shining. Color 

 much the same, the antennae and legs wholly a very pale yellow, the 

 beak, front part of head and last three ventrals reddish-brown or tinged 

 with that hue; cuneus only slightly or not at all tinged with fuscous; 

 membrane clear white. Pronotum relatively smaller with transverse 

 impression represented only by a vague median fovea and front portion 



