154 U"'-^' 



at Qiieenbovongh. Subsequently Commander Walker found it in plenty at 

 Shellness, Isle of Sheppey [see Ent. Mo. Mag. xxii, 196(1896)]. In an inte- 

 resting list, published as a supplement to tbe " Victoria County History of 

 Sussex," by Messrs. L. G. Cox, G. B. Ryle, and C. E. Totteuliam [Eut. Mo. 

 Mag. Ivi, 228-31 (1920], tbe authors enumerate a number of beetles new to 

 the Sussex List. Among these, however, are two species which have been 

 recorded for the county before — namely, Liparus coronatus Goeze, taken by 

 me at Great Salvington and Gorring, and Codioso^na spadix in " sea-breakers " 

 at West Worthing [see Ent. Ilec. xxlx, 226-28 (1917)]. C. spadix was also 

 taken by B. G. Rye at Lancing early in the 'nineties, and is recorded in the 

 supplement to " Fowler." — Horace Donisthorpe, Putney : June 1921. 



Ilenoticus serratus, etc., at Peebles. — On May 26th I observed on a stump 

 in a wood here, which was cleared last year, a specimen of Henoticus serratus 

 Gyll. Further search on the 27th, 30th, and 31st led to the discovery of six 

 more examples of this rarity, under bark of beech stumps. On May 2()th 

 I took a single example of Jlovudium exi(/iiuin Gyll. amongst dead leaves by 

 a fallen birch-tree, together with three Quediiis fmnatiis Steph. On 4th June, 

 in the same wood, I obtained under fir bark a single example of Dryocaetes 

 aiitoi/raphti.'f Ratz., and in fungoid growth beneath a fallen birch-tree one 

 specimen of Sphaerites ylabratus F, — Jamks E. Black, Nethercroft, Peebles -. 

 June SfA, 1921. 



Silpltn (fiadripunctata L.hoverinc). — ]My personal experience of this species 

 shows it to be so rare and local, though of wide distribution, that observations 

 upon its habits must be difficult to come at. By glancing through my diaries 

 since 1889, I find that it has invariably occurred to me singly, till 1921 : in 

 1894 it turned up in Ilolbrook Park, Suffi)lk ; in 1895 on oak in a fir-wood at 

 Beaulieu in the New Forest; and from 1896 to 1902 annually by beating oak 

 and birch and white poplar in the Bentley Woods near Ipswich. It does not 

 seem to have been taken in Norfolk since Burrell's time, about 1810. Stephens 

 says the imago may be taken during June and July ; but Samouelle,who gives 

 a good figure (as also does Martyn in 1792), more correctly refers it in 1819 to May 

 and June. My own dates range onlj^ from 17th May to 11th June, during which 

 time it baa been taken at Bentley also by Elliot, Vinter, and Baylis. It is a 

 widely distributed species with us, and Von Heyden's 1906 Catalogue ranges 

 it through " Europa media borealis " under Thomson's generic name Xylodrepa. 

 The remarkable point about the species is that it is never found in carrion ; 

 nor have I till this year seen it on the wing. But on 18th May last, three 

 occurred to me flying low over young bracken at Bentley: and on 25th I was 

 much interested to see some half-dozen hovering, like Bombi, at the extremities 

 of both oak- and pine-twigs some twelve feet from the ground there. They 

 showed no propensity to alight; but, as the oaks were being badly defoliated 

 by Tortrix viridana, I expect the explanation is to be found in Calwer's 1869 

 note that this species, like Calosoma, attacks the nests of Bombyx processionea ; 

 *ilso, probably, Awy other Lepidopterous larvae when in undue quantities. — 

 Claude Morley, Monks' Soham House, near Framlinghain : ^Qth May, 1921. 



Another Early Season, — It is rarely that we have two consecutive winters 

 and springs so nnld iis have been the past two, and in both cases the effect on 



