PRELIMINARY AND MINOR PAPERS 



THREE-CORNERED ALFALFA HOPPER 



By V. L. WiLDERMUTH, 



Entomological Assistant, Cereal and Forage Insect Investigations, 

 Bureau of Entomology 



INTRODUCTION 



The small triangular insect of the hemipterous family Membracidae on 

 which this paper is based was first noted and described as Membracis 

 festina by Thomas Say in 1831 (i);' and in 1869 Stal (2, 3) referred it 

 to the genus Stictocephala. Since that time it has frequently been noted 

 by entomological writers, who usually merely mentioned its occurrence 

 in a new locality or repeated what had already been observed. In 1888 

 this insect was first noted in literature as being injurious (4). However, 

 the species was not generally considered of economic importance until 

 the winter of 1910, when Prof. Herbert Osbom, in a paper (11) read 

 before the American Association of Economic Entomologists, called 

 attention to the economic habits of the genus Stictocephala and gave 

 special attention to the species 5. festina and its economic relation to 

 alfalfa and clover. 



Prof. Osbom in his paper stated that little or nothing was known of 

 the life history and habits of the species. It is the purpose of this paper 

 to give a report of the same, together with other related data, as collected 

 by the writer, assisted by Messrs. R. N. Wilson and T. Scott Wilson at 

 Tempe, Ariz., and by Mr. Edmund H. Gibson at Greenwood, Miss. 



SPECIFIC IDENTITY OF THE THREE-CORNERED ALFALFA HOPPER 



The name "three-cornered alfalfa hopper," adopted for this insect 

 because it is the common term applied to it by farmers throughout areas 

 of heavy infestation, is applicable to both Say's (i) Stictocephala festina 

 and Van Duzee's (10) Stictocephala festina, var. rufivitta. On several 

 occasions Mr. Otto Heidemann has determined a few specimens as 5. 

 festina, var. rufivitta, among material sent to the Bureau of Entomology 

 for identification. As these were secured both by Mr. Gibson in Tennes- 

 see and Mississippi and by the writer in Arizona, one is led to believe that 

 the species and the so-called variety occur rather generally together. 

 Since Van Duzee (10) bases his description of the rufivitta variety upon 

 male specimens only, and since only male specimens among hundreds 

 examined have exhibited the determining character — namely, that 

 "the dorsal carinae are not evanescent before their point of meeting the 



^ Reference is made by number to " Literature cited," p. 36a. 



Journal of Atrricultural Research, Vol. III. No. 4 



Dcpt. of Acriculture. WashinEton. D. C. J m. 15, 1915 



(343) 



