266 [November, 



ANTIPODEAN FIELD NOTES. 



III. -A SKETCH OF THE ENTOMOLOGY OF SYDNEY, N.S.W. 



BY JAMES J. WALKKR, M.A., R.N., F.L.S. 



{Continued from page 233). 



We now come to the Coleoptera, the Order of insects perhaps 

 best represented of all in the Sydney district ; and my experience 

 there enables me to state that, outside the more luxuriant regions of 

 the Tropics, there are few if any localities where a really fine and 

 handsome series of beetles can be so readily brought together in a 

 short time by a diligent collector. The number of species occurring 

 within a radius of twenty miles from Sydney can hardly, at the lowest 

 estimate, fall short of 2000, and all the leading groups, with possibly 

 the exception of the Brachelytra, are more or less conspicuously re- 

 presented ; while the Sternoxi, the PhytopJiaga, the Longicorns, and 

 especially the weevils, present an almost endless variety of curious 

 and interesting forms. Most of these are, however, not readily to be 

 found by the newly-arrived Coleopterist, unless he happen to arrive 

 at Sydney in the early part of the summer, when the number of large 

 and showy beetles to be seen everywhere in the " bush " will not fail 

 to compel his admiration. 



At the time of my first visit to Sydney, in the middle of February, 

 1900, very many species of Coleoptera were over for the season, and 

 comparatively few were in evidence in the open. But after a few 

 preliminary excursions beetles were found abundantly enough ; and 

 I found that the most remunerative method of collecting, at this time 

 of year and for several months afterwards, was to pick off the flakes 

 of exfoliating b:irk from the trunks of the gum-trees into a net, or 

 still better, into an inverted umbrella. The quantity and variety of 

 insect life revealed in this way is at times quite startling, and it is as 

 well to " stand from under " when an unusually large piece of bark 

 is pulled off, or the collector may find himself in a veritable shower- 

 bath of beetles, cockroaches, centipedes, and spiders little and big ; 

 some of the latter with legs extending over a space of five or six 

 inches in diameter, are it is true harmless enough, but are none the 

 less somewhat unpleasant creatures to get down one's back. The very 

 poisonous scarlet and bliicl< spider, Latro(hctus hasselfi (identical with 

 the notorious " Katipo " of New Zealand), is sometimes found in this 

 situation, but is more frequently seen under logs and stones in dry 

 places, where it preys chiefly on large terrestrial weevils and other 

 beetles. Scorpions, too, are often rather common under bark, especially 

 in the Tllawarra district, but are of small size and sluggish habits ; and 

 more than once T have met with venomous snakes lurking under the 

 large sheets of loose bark on fallen trees. 



