2oO IMnil 



ANOTHER APTEROUS MALE IN THE COCCIDM (ACANTHOCOCCUS 

 ACERIS, SIG-NORET). 



BY JULES LICHTENSTELX. 



In 1877, I described in this Magazine (Vol. xiv, p. 34), the first 

 apterous male I was aware of in the Coccidce : it was an underground 

 one. Since that time I discovered also that in G-ossyparia ulmi and 

 Ritsemia pupifera the males are wingless. 



To-day, I have to mention another which is completely apterous ; 

 it belongs to a well-known insect, feeding on the maple-tree {Acer 

 platanoides and pseudoplatanus) and named by Signoret, " Acantho- 

 coccus accris."" The maple-tree is much inhabited by bark-lice, as I 

 have in my collection, besides the above-named " Acanthococcus :" 

 Lecanium aceris, Curtis, 183S ; Westwood, 1840 ; Bouche, 1844 ; 

 Pseudococcus aceris, Signoret and others : Pulvinaria aceris, Licht. 

 (ined.) : Chionaspis aceris, Sign. All these have winged males. Curtis 

 and Westwood have described the Lecanium, and Miss Smith, of Peoria 

 (Illinois), has lately made known the Pseudococcus. Leaving for 

 another occasion the monography of the maple-lice, which will some 

 day follow the elm-lice and terebinth-lice, described already in the 

 " Feuille des jeunes Naturalistes," I intend to speak to-day only of 

 the " Acanthococcus. " The female and larvae of that insect are well 

 described in Signoret's " Coccides," Ann. Soc. Ent. .France, 1874, p. 

 34 ; but nothing is said of the male, nor of the biology. 



The male is brown-reddish, of the usual form of the Coccidce, but 

 absolutely without wings. Its length is 0'70 mm., the antennae are 

 ten-jointed, rather hairy, and 038 mm. ; third joint the largest ; 

 the abdomen is terminated by a small protuberance, bearing the short 

 penis, on each side of which are two small triangular pieces supporting 

 two long white tails of a cottony matter, as usual in the male Coc- 

 cidians. 



The biology is as follows : — By the beginning of May the female 

 lays in the interior of the bag, in which she is entirely enclosed, rather 

 large eggs, from which are produced small oval larvae, which gather 

 under the leaves and remain there sucking and increasing very little 

 until the fall, when they hide in the bark-crevices. In winter the 

 larvae which are to become males exude a cotton-like cocoon, entirely 

 closed in front, but open behind. 



"When the cocoon is ready, and in the first half of January (here 

 at Montpellier), the larva throws off the rather strong-spined larval 

 skin, and appears as a soft white maggot, quite smooth, showing only 



