BITING MIDGES — WIRTH AND BLANTON 251 



allows approximately 2 feet of clearance at the bottom of the tent. A 



light is hung inside near the top of the tent, and the insects that enter 



at the bottom are captured from the sides with an aspirator or killing 



bottle. 



For a 2-year period beginning August 1951 the following collections 



were made in 517 nights of trap operation: 



Numbers of individuals collected in — 

 Insect 1951 (5 mo.) 1952 1953 (8 mo.) 



Culicoides 105, 586 235, 555 84, 000 



Mosquitoes 73, 615 70, 867 96, 091 



Phlebotomus 6,114 31,417 1,492 



Of the 150 localities where traps were operated, only the following 

 received concentrated attention with more than 10 nights of operation, 

 the remainder having been visited only from 1 to 10 nights each: 



Locality Nights Months 



Almirante ^ 58 6 



Garachin^ 12 1 



Jaqu6 11 2 



La JoUa 16 10 



Loma Boracho 22 12 



Mojinga Swamp 76 12 



Patino Point 74 4 



Tocumen 26 9 



In spite of this coverage most of Panama has been very inadequately 

 surveyed. The only possible exception is the Mojinga Swamp, where 

 the trapping was done constantly over the entire period. At 

 Almirante most of the trapping was done at one yellow fever tree 

 station in a deep tropical rain forest, and many other habitats were 

 not sampled. For unavoidable technical reasons the Darien trap 

 locations were unsatisfactory for sampling Culicoides populations. 

 Far too few collections were made from the subtropical mountain 

 locations at Cerro Campana in Panamd Province and El Valle in 

 Code Province, where nevertheless many unique records were ob- 

 tained. The transect up the slope of the Volcan in Chiriqui Province 

 was far too scanty to obtain more than a barest indication of that 

 interesting temperate fauna. We have been able to secure only 

 species that will come to light or horse-baited traps. From studies 

 in North America we suspect that up to 10 or 20 percent of the fauna 

 would never be taken in light traps and even fewer at animal bait. 

 Tlius at least a dozen additional species could very likely have been 

 taken by a program of collection and rearing from larval habitats, 

 had that been possible. 



The light traps were equipped daily with jars containing fresh 

 potassium cyanide, and the catches were placed each morning in 

 pasteboard pill boxes and brouglit into the laboratory. A layer of 



