124 BULLETIN 190, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



Distribution. — Georgia, Florida, Alabama, Virginia, and Maryland 

 coastal regions. 



Type. — Male. In the American Museum of Natural History. From 

 Georgia. 



Remarks. — Nearly a hundred years before Hy. Edwards's description 

 was published this species was well illustrated by an original water-color 

 drawing, accompanied by field notes, in John Abbot's "Georgia Insects" 

 (vol. 7, p. 34, 1792), but it was not named. The figure is that of a male. 

 The dissimilarity of the sexes was not recognized until the capture of a 

 pair in coitus by Frank M. Jones, at Summerville, Ga., in April 1907. 

 Since then the following specimens have been obtained : Jacksonville, 

 Fla., 1 female, Mrs. A.'T. Slosson (no date) ; vicinity of Mobile, Ala., 

 males and females, March 25, 1925, May 15, 1934, June 19, 1928, Sep- 

 tember 29, 1929 (Thomas Van Allen and G. P. Engelhardt). These 

 records show a long period of emergence. The moths are attracted to 

 flowers, particularly those of chinquapin, along the edges of swamps. 

 The food plant of the larva is sour-gum (Nyssa). The task of collecting 

 larvae and pupae has proved difficult, for the species, although widely dis- 

 tributed, does not occur in heavy infestations. Large, well-matured trees 

 having places of injury and healing wounds are preferred for attack. 

 Otherwise there is little outside evidence of the larval work under the 

 thick bark. The tunnels are long and sinuous, moist with sap, scraping 

 the surface of the solid wood but not entering it. The pupa is within an 

 oblong cocoon of chips, very much like those of the peach borer, San- 

 ninoidea exitiosa, with the exit facing a crevice in the bark. Rearing 

 efforts produced only three examples, two females and one male. The 

 females, collected as larvae in woodlands near Boiling Field, D. C, early 

 in May, transformed successfully, the adults emerging on June 5 and 6. 

 The male, collected as a pupa in the bark of a huge sour-gum at Solomons 

 Island, Md., on June 15, emerged on June 18; several pupal exuviae 

 observed on this tree indicate that emergence normally occurs earlier. 



THAMNOSPUECIA ALLERI. new species 



Plate 26, Figure 157 



Male. — Antennae long, slender, moderately dilated toward the tips, 

 rusty black. Labial palpi golden yellow throughout. Head black, coarsely 

 tufted on top. Collar golden yellow. Thorax rusty black, striped with 

 yellow at the sides above and beneath and with broad yellow patches 

 anterior to wing base. Abdomen dull black, slightly lustrous; fourth 

 segment on posterior half above deep yellow and fifth segment with a 

 mixture of yellow and black scales; segments 4, 5, 6, and 7 deep yellow 

 beneath; the wedge-shaped anal tuft black, edged with white to the tip. 

 Legs golden yellow ; tibiae broadly banded with black above posterior 

 spurs. Forewing nearly opaque, rusty black with a partly obscured, 



