Platychirus. 205 



pale hairs, vvith some longer hairs at the base; ihe hind femora are 

 haired as usual with pale hairs, the hind tibiæ have some few, long, 

 dark hairs on the antero-dorsal side about the middle; hind meta- 

 tarsi a little thickened. Wings hyaline oi- nearly so. Squamulæ 

 whitish to brownish white and with a whitish fringe. Halteres pale 

 yellow. 



Female. Frons and epistoma not broad ; frons bluish with moderate 

 side dust spots and with the hairs black above and below, yellow in 

 the middle. Thorax short-haired, the hairs erect. Abdomen with the 

 spots about as in the male, but more transverse ; there are only three 

 pairs, the fifth segment without spots ; sometimes the spots are rather 

 hoary. Anterior legs yellow with only faint, brown rings on tibiæ; 

 the front femora have as in the male a peculiar, combined, white 

 hair at the base, but it is straight, small and inconspicuous; hind 

 femora yellow with a broad, dark ring near the apex, and hind tibiæ 

 yellow at base and apex. 



Length 7,3—9 mm. 



This species is in the male distinguished at once by the chai-acters 

 on the anterior legs; in the female it somewhat resembles peltatus, 

 but it is easily known by the less produced epistoma and upper 

 mouth edge, the slightly more erect thoracai pubescence, the smaller 

 abdominal spots, especially the first pair and the want of a fourth 

 pair; fmally it is a smaller species. — The finger-like prolongation at 

 the base of the middle legs is not placed on the trochanter, as stated 

 by Verrall, but on the coxa_, and it is, as also the dent-like process in 

 peltatus, a special development of the thin, chitinous prolongation of the 

 front side of the coxa commonly present. — I possess a herma- 

 phroditic specimen of this species ; it has female exterior genitalia, but 

 the last segments are not quite as in a normal female. The frons is 

 about as broad as in normal females; anterior femora and tibiæ 

 coloured about as in the male ; the right front femur has the peculiar 

 white hair and two small clumps of black, tangled hairs ; on the left 

 femur they are less developed; the tibiæ are almost not flattened, the 

 tarsi somewhat broad and flat but not much; middle legs simple. 

 The specimen is melanoid with a black abdomen. 



F. scutatus is not just common in Denmark; Copenhagen in a 

 garden, Frederiksberg Have, Charlottenlund, Ordrup Mose, Dyrehaven, 

 Geel Skov, Trørød, Tyvekrog, Egebæks Vang; on Langeland at Lohals; 

 on Funen at Middelfart, Strib and on Fænø; in Jutland in Vejle 

 Nørreskov, at Horsens, Hald near Viborg and Jerup near Frederiks- 

 havn. The dates are ^^/s— ^''/o, but it is most common in the later 

 part of the summer. 



