214 



The Orders of Insects 



segments except the front pair in the males which have only three. 

 The eleven-segmented, clubbed feelers arise in front of the eyes ; 

 the mandibles are bifid at the tip. The larvae are campodeiform, the 

 segments having chitinised tergites and long bristles, and the 

 hindmost bearing a pair of short cercopods. The Mycetophagidse 

 live in fungi, under bark, and such obscure places. They are 

 distributed over all parts of the world. 



Dermestidae. — The Bermestida are a family of beetles character- 

 ised by eleven-segmented feelers inserted in front of the eyes and 

 ending in a club, a quadrate mentum, a short pronotum with 

 cavities beneath for the reception of the feelers, a prominent 

 mesosternum and a short metasternum, elytra not or very faintly 

 striated covering the hind-body, short legs, the shins with stout 



spurs, and the feet 

 Ij c i %^ S with five segments 



of which the first 

 four are short and 

 equal and the fifth 

 long with simple 

 claws. The larvse 

 have small 

 rounded heads 

 with very short 

 feelers, and six 

 ocelli on each side; 

 the body is thin- 

 skinned with a 

 dense hairy cover- 

 ing and the legs 

 are short, each 

 with a single 

 claw. The pupa 

 is partly clothed 

 with the cast, 

 hairy larval-skin. 

 The Dermestidae 

 are distributed 

 throughout the world ; some live on plants, but the best known 

 species — Bermestes vulpinus (fig. 1 1 8) for example — feed in skins and 

 food-materials where they often do great damage. 



Byrrhidae. — The Byrrhida or Pill-beetles are oval, very convex 

 beetles with head concealed beneath the pronotum. The clubbed 

 feelers have eleven or (rarely) ten segments. The mesosternum is 

 small and the metasternum short and broad. The legs are short 

 and stout, largely hidden beneath the body; the shins have grooves 

 into which the five-segmented feet can be folded back. The larvae 

 have the prothorax and the two hindmost abdominal segments 

 chitinised, and much larger than the other segments which are soft- 



FiG. ii8. — k. %\Cvi\-^e.z\\z{Dermestesvul^inus), Europe. 

 a. egg ; i. tip of male abdomen from beneath ; b. c. 

 larva ; h. pupa, ij natural size ; d. abdominal seg- 

 ment of larva with hairs removed to show spines 

 and tubercles ; e. head of larva ; f. ist maxilla ; g. 

 2nd maxillse of l.irva, more highly magnified. From 

 Jones (after Riley), Insect Life, vol. 2 (U.S. Dept. 

 Agr.). 



