290 THE ENTOMOLOGIST. 



DIPTEROUS PLANT-MINERS IN THEIR PERFECT STATE. 

 By PiiTER Inchbald, F.L.S. 



In a paper on the subject of plant-miners, which I commu- 

 nicated to this magazine last autumn (Entom. xiv. 41), I spoke 

 of the earlier stages of these plant-mining Diptera, — their larva 

 and pupa state, — together with their habits of life and phases of 

 development. This year I have been fairly successful in rearing 

 the imagines, and I gladly place my observations, such as they 

 are, in the hands of those of your readers who may be interested 

 in our mining Diptera. I must mention at the very outset that 

 I have had the privilege of the diagnoses of Dr. Meade, of Brad- 

 ford, in the identification of most of those species that I have 

 happened to rear; diagnosis in species so closely allied is in 

 many cases very difficult. My very best thanks are due to him, 

 as are those of our dipterists generally, for the patience and 

 perseverance he has shown in his discriminations. As in my 

 previous paper I w-ill give the various classes of plants, and the 

 Diptera that affect them. 



Eanunculace^e. — Ranunculus repens yielded me, though 

 scantily, Phytomijza flava, Fallen. It is a pretty little fly, and 

 very lively in its movements. The pupa from which it emerged 

 is shining bottle-green in colour. The imagines began to appear 

 on the loth of July. Dr. Meade remarks that P. flava was the 

 name given to it by Fallen in 1823. Goureau and Desvoidy 

 have since described it under the name Ranunculi, a better 

 name, perhaps, if the insect should prove an exclusive feeder on 

 Ranunculus. Fallen seems to have known nothing of the food- 

 plant. The leaves of the columbine of our gardens showed 

 extensive mining in the autumn of 1880. Sometimes two mines 

 occupied one leaf. They pupated within the glass-topped box, 

 the pupa being of a shining amber-colour. The imagines 

 appeared in the spring of 1881, and proved to be the Phjtoniyza 

 ancholce of Goureau and Desvoidy, which is identical with the 

 Pliytoniyza obscurella of Fallen. I bred fully a dozen of this fly 

 in May of the present year. 



UMBELLiFEKiE. — Plujtoinyza, alhiccps, the feeder on Heraclcnm, 

 I find bestows his attentions on various ComposiUe, as well as 

 Umhelliferce. I have bred this lly from ivy-leaved lettuce (Lactuca 



