21:;i FIRST ANNUAL REPORT OF THE STATE ENTOMOLOGIST. 



is a very large one, containing no less than fifty-seven North American 

 genera and three hundred and thirty-six species, as given in Osten 

 Sacken's catalogue.* Many of them are conspicuously marked with 

 brown and yellow bands or spots upon their flattened bodies. While 

 many are smooth, others, as in the genera Volucella, Eristalis, Helo- 

 pliilus and Mallota are hairy, and often from their colors and liirsute- 

 ness so strongly resemble bees that they are not infrequently mistaken 

 ior them. The larvae of many species are of eminent service in destroy- 

 ing plant-lice (Aphides), among which the parent Syrplius deposits 

 her egg, where the young larvae, which are destitute of eyes, have only 

 to reach out with their extensile bodies in order to find their pre}'. 

 Several species of Eristalis and others are aquatic, living during their 

 larval stage in the water, where they burrow in the mud, and breathe 

 through a long respiratory tube with which they are provided, which 

 they protrude from the water for the reception of air. Other species 

 ( Volucella) occur in the nests of bees and wasps where they feed ui)on 

 the larvas and pupse. Still others are found in decaying wood, in 

 vegetable mold, in the soil about decaying bulbs, and in the filth of 

 cess-pools. 



A Strange Location for the Larvae. 

 Dr. Packard, in his brief notice of this species, under the 

 name of Mallota harda, states that " the puparium or pupa-case 

 closely resembles that of Eristalis, in possessing a long respiratory 

 tube, showing that the maggot undoubtedly lives in the water, and 

 when desirous of breathing, protrudes the tube out of the water, thus 

 drawing in air enough to fill its internal respiratory tubes (tracheaj)." 

 The long breathing-tube would seem to be a fitting provision for such 

 a mode of life, moreover, it is almost identical in appearance with the 

 figure given by Glover [MS. Notes of Diptera, pi. 7, f. 28), of Helo- 

 philus tenax, now included in the genus Eristalis, which is generally 

 regarded as aquatic. The conditions, however, under which the larvae 

 occurred from which I bred the perfect insect, render it probable that 

 the present species is not aquatic. They were taken from a birch tree 

 which stood on a knoll, twenty-five to thirty rods from the nearest 

 water. At about thirty feet from the ground a limb had been broken 

 off, and water had been admitted, causing a decay in the heart-wood 

 for about three feet in extent. From this decayed material the two 

 larvae (together with others of different character which were not pre- 

 served) were taken and sent to me, in the fine black mold in which 

 they were buried. The tree-trunk elsewhere was perfectly sound. 



*Six genera and a number of new species have since been added. See " Contribution ta 

 a Monograph of the North American Syrpbidae," by Dr. S. W, Williston, in Proc. Amer, 

 Philosoph. Soc, 1882, xx, pp. 299-332. 



