^February, '13] COOLEY: SPOTTED FEVER TICK 93 



doors, and have not even put the screens on our out-door sleeping porch 

 the past summer. This is the result of quite a long anti-mosquito cam- 

 paign in Worcester, Mass. It was begun by my class in biology mak- 

 ing a mosquito survey of the city in 1902, then the schools, some of 

 them, took up the matter; the pupils attending to stagnant water 

 about their own homes and also draining and oiling pools in different 

 sections of the city. This all went to form the basis of more thorough 

 and permanent action. The Blackstone River was walled and all 

 swampy places along its course filled. Beaver Brook has been laid in 

 a cement channel and the low places are now being filled in this district, 

 so that now a little oil on the few remaining pools gives us practical 

 freedom from mosquitoes, which had formerly made certain parts of 

 the city almost uninhabitable. Malaria, which had been gaining 

 ground rapidly is now almost, if not quite, banished from Worcester. 

 The last thing that remains is to find some effective treatment for 

 catch basins in sewers. This is the "last ditch" for C. pipiens and, 

 at times, is a very serious problem. There ought to be some kind 

 of float invented for the outflow pipe which will make the use of sur- 

 face oiling effective in the catch-basins of cities. 



President W. D. Hunter: If there is no further discussion, we 

 will have Prof. Cooley read his paper on "Notes on the Habits of the 

 Spotted Fever Tick." 



NOTES ON LITTLE KNOWN HABITS OF THE ROCKY 

 MOUNTAIN SPOTTED FEVER TICK (DERMACENTOR 



VENUSTUS BANKS) 



By R. A. Cooley, Montana Agricidlural College 



It is well known that most ticks in all of the active stages of 

 their development ascend grass, small bushes or other supports in 

 order that they may catch hold of passing animals. This adaptation 

 is a very necessary one in view of the fact that their only chance of 

 securing a host is by waiting for one to pass within reach. 



In connection with the investigations of the Rocky IMountain 

 Spotted fever tick {Dermacentor venustus Banks) in the Bitter Root 

 Valley, Montana, in cooperation with the Bureau of Entomology, 

 interesting observations have been made on the waiting habit of this 

 species. In numerous instances in nature and in out-of-door condi- 

 tions, which very closely "resemble nature, adults of this tick have 

 been found in a definite "waiting attitude" which we regard as habit- 

 ual. A dead, bare, upright twig, or grass stem, is usually selected 



