20 



Anopheles maculipennis, Mg. 



The Spotted Gnat. 



Plate 4. 



Like the foregoing species, this is one of the mosquitoes chiefly 

 concerned in the dissemination of malaria in Itah' at the present da_\-. 

 It is widely distributed in Great Britain, and is verj- common in many 

 places. In Ireland it was recorded by Haliday in 1827 (' Zool. 

 Journal,' Vol. III. (1828), p. 501) as occurring "in profusion, in the 

 neighbourhood of Belfast, throughout the summer and autumn." In 

 England, according to Theobald {pp. cit. p. 193), the time of appear- 

 ance of this species is "from March to May, and again from June to 

 December." The same writer adds that : — " The majority appear in 

 July and August. Females only occur early in the year." He also 

 states that specimens " may be found in the daytime settled inside 

 outhouses and privies." British females of A. maculipennis would 

 appear sometimes to be less blood-thirst}- tiian those of either of the 

 foregoing species, and Theobald's experience has been that botii 

 sexes subsist entirely on vegetable food. If this is the case it would 

 suggest that a change must have taken place in the feeding-habits of 

 British females of this species, since the time when ague (malaria) 

 was prevalent in this country. Nevertheless there can be no doubt 

 that on occasion females of A. maculipennis in the British Islands 

 suck blood at the present time. Thus, in their paper on ' The Geo- 

 graphical Distribution of Anopheles in Relation to the Former Dis- 

 tribution of Ague in England,' published in January, I90i,it is stated 

 by Nuttall, Cobbett, and Strangeways-Pigg (Joe. cit., p. 10) on the basis 

 of investigations made in the previous year : — " That the English 

 Anopheles maculipenuis is just as fond of blood as its continental con- 

 freres has been amply proved by experiment during July and 

 August." Again, a correspondent who wrote from Langport, Somerset, 

 on August 1 6th, 1905, and forwarded for identification specimens of 

 this species and Tlieobaldia annulata, Schrk. (Plate 5), complained 

 that : — " Since residing in Langport, which is on the level of Sedge- 



