282 JOURNAL OF ECONOMIC ENTOMOLOGY [Vol. 10 



By the first of July all the adults had emerged. The locality was 

 revisited on October 20th at which time adult beetles were to be found 

 under the litter at the base of the dandelion plants and undoubtedly 

 these insects hibernate as adults. 



An insect which can destroy approximately one-quarter of the seed 

 crop of a noxious weed is no small factor in farm economics. The 

 dandelion, on the other hand, is now quite extensively used as a green 

 vegetable in certain parts of the country and here the insect in question 

 when abundant will be a crop pest. 



THE TWO-BANDED FUNGUS BEETLE ^ 



By F. H. Chittenden, Sc. D., In Charge of Truck Crop and Stored Product Insect 

 Investigations, Bureau of Entomology, United States Department of Agriculture 



Introduction 



Among species of tenebrionid beetles which habitually frequent 

 mills, granaries, and other storehouses is a species belonging to a 

 different group from any of the several flour beetles, the tribe Diaperini, 

 which is mostly composed of species which live on fungus or dead or 

 decaying vegetable matter — the two-banded fungus beetle {Alphi- 

 tophagus hifasciatus Say). This species, though now cosmopolitan 

 and credited with exotic origin, would appear to be one of the few 

 cosmopolites native to America, from which country it was described 

 by Say in 1824 (1). This origin, however, is decidedly doubtful. 



In 1832 it was redescribed by Stephens (2) from England under the 

 name of Alphitophagus quadripustulatus, the genus having been 

 especially erected for this species. It has only been in somewhat 

 recent years that the identity of Phyletkus hifasciatus Say with the 

 European form has been established. 



Descriptive 



The Beetle 

 In appearance this pretty little beetle, shown in Figure 15, resembles 

 some of the fungus-eating Mycetophagidse, to which family belongs 

 Typhaa jumata, an insect of similar habits, more than it does any of 

 the other farinivorous Tenebrionidse. In form it is elongate oval, 

 convex, depressed, and a little less than one eighth of an inch long. 

 Its color is red brown, with two broad black bands across the elytra or 

 wing-covers. 



Published by permission of the Secretary of Agriculture 



