34 Journal New York Entomological Society. fVoi xxv. 



A NEW VARIETY OF SCAPHINOTUS. 



By Charles W. Leng, 



West New Brighton, N. Y. 



The specimens in our collections under the name Scaphinotus (or 

 Cychrus) ridingsii Bland include two forms, as I was first informed 

 by Mr. H. S. Barber, of the U. S. National Museum. One form in- 

 habits the region drained by the Potomac River and is the form first 

 described by Bland, his type locality being " Hampshire Co., Virginia,"'- 

 which since the separation of West Virginia, has become part of the 

 latter state and is near the source of the Potomac. Other specimens 

 of this typical form were collected by myself near Warm Springs, 

 Bath Co., Virginia, in October, 1899, by sifting deep accumulations of 

 leaves in the woods or by seeing them cross the path at dusk. In 

 recent years, nine specimens of the typical form have been found 

 near Washington, D. C, on the Virginia shore of the Potomac, oppo- 

 site Plummer's Island. Two of these were found at night by Mr. 

 Barber while hunting food for his Lampyride larvae. All these typ- 

 ical ridingsii have thus been found near the Potomac River or its 

 tributaries. 



A different form, distinguishable by its broader shape, shorter and 

 more coarsely punctate elytra, inhabits that part of Pennsylvania 

 drained by the Monongahela River and its tributaries and is appar- 

 ently more common in collections than the typical form, with which 

 it has been confused. It is first referred to by Bland a year after his 

 original description in his statement that Mr. H. Ulke " captured sev- 

 eral specimens in the neighborhood of Altoona, Pa."^ It was the 

 form before Dr. Geo. H. Horn when he wrote " the specimens I have 

 seen were all collected by Mr. Ulke, near Cresson Springs, Pa.,"^ and 

 the basis of his comparison of ridingsii with " a diminutive an- 

 drewsii"; and has perhaps become for many collectors the sole repre- 

 sentative of Bland's species. However the difference has not re- 

 mained unnoticed for Mr. Chas. Liebeck gave in Entomological News* 



1 Proc. Ent. Soc. Phil., I, 1863, p. 353. 



2 Proc. Ent. Soc. Phil., II, 1864, p. 323. 



3 Trans. Am. Ent. Soc, VII, 1878, p. 174. 



* Ent. News, X, p. 193; pi. VI, figs. 10-12. 



