1902 ENTOMOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 99 



HYMENOPTERA. 

 By W. Hague Harrington, Ottawa. 



Collectors are being gradually attracted to this important order, and several nice lots 

 have been sent in for determination. Among those who are now collecting may be mentioned 

 Mr. R.V. Harvey, Vancouver, B.C.; Mr. E. P. Venables, Vernon, B.C.; Mr. A. G. Leavitt, St. 

 John, N.B. ; Mr. J. B. A. Leo Leymarie, Montreal, and Dr. Schmitt, Anticosti Island, Que. 

 This number will undoubtedly increase as our members realize how much of interest from the 

 scientitic standpoint, and how much of importance from an economic aspect the species of this 

 order possess. The enormous number of species, even in our northern regions, ensures the 

 continual discovei-y of rare and new forms, thus giving a frequent stimulus to the collector and 

 student of them. Indeed, the trouble at present is not so much to obtain new material as to 

 determine and utilize what is received. This difficulty will gradually disappear as specimens 

 become named and arranged in a greater number of accessible collections, and as classifications 

 are placed upon a more durable basis and synopses and descriptive monographs are multiplied. 



No works dealing specially with Canadian Hymenoptera have, I think, appeared during 

 the year, but tlVe several entomological magazines have contained various articles in which 

 species from Canada are described or mentioned. Ashmead has continued in the Canadian 

 Entomologist his valuable papers on the "Classification of the Fossorial, Predaceous and Para- 

 sitic Wasps, or the Suijer-family Vespoidea," and in the November number of the Canadian 

 Entomologist the family Trigonalidfe is reached and tabulated. An annotated list of the Ottawa 

 species of the Super-family Sphegoidea was published in the Ottatoa Naturalist, vol. xv. p. 215, 

 January 1902 (Harrington). Though not treating of Canadian specimens, the "Papers from the 

 Harriman Alaska Expedition " are of extreme interest and value, as a large proportion of the 

 insects catalogued and described are certain to be distributed through our adjacent territories, 

 some indeed being transcontinental in their distribution. The entomologist to the expedition 

 was Prof. Trevor Kincaid, and the extent of his collections testify to his ability and assiduity. 

 He has discussed the Tenthredinoidea in paper No. vii. , enumerating over fifty species, of 

 which more than one-half are new. He has also, in paper No. xiv. , dealt with the Sphegoidea 

 and Vespoidea, of which only nine species occurred, two of which are new. The Formicoidea 

 yielded only six species which were considered by Pergande. All the rest of the Hymenoptera 

 were placed in Ashmead's hands and proved very rich in new species. His report, paper No. 

 xxviii., contains not only the descriptions of these but is a complete catalogue of all species 

 now known from Alaska. These number in all 335 species of which he describes 201 as new. 

 This will give some idea of the yet unknown riches of our own. northern fauna. An inter- 

 esting paper has been received from Dr. Kiaer of Tromso Museum, Norway- ' ' Die arktishen 

 Tenthrediniden " — a catalogue of the Arctic sawflies of Europe, Asia and America, which 

 enumerates a number of Canadian species. 



The material amassed during the past season by our various collectors is as yet largely 

 undetermined ; even the Ottawa species showing a very large proportion unnamed. The fol- 

 lowing list, therefore, does not pretend to give in any measure a complete record, but men- 

 tions only a few of the species which appear of more than ordinaiy interest : 



Bombus frigidus. Smith. This is an Arctic species recorded from Great Slave Lake and 

 the Yukon River. Females and workers received from Anticosti Island (Schmitt). 



Bombus juxtiis, Cress. From Coldstream, B.C. (Harvey). 



Bombus mixtuosus, Ashm. One of the new species described from Alaska. Specimens 

 from Vancouver (Harvey), Rocky Mountains, Laggan ? (Bean) and Banff, Alta., (Fletcher). A 

 worker minor from Nepigon (Fletcher) may also possibly belong to this species. 



Bombomelecta thoracica. Cress. Vernon, B.C. (Venables). 



