CHARLES SCHAEFFER. 249 



On BRADYCI»fETUS and BOLBOCERA^i of Xorlli 

 America, with notes on other Scarabteidie. 



BY CHA8. SCHAEFFER, BROOKLYN, N. Y. 



Boucomont in "Genera Tnsectorum," family Geotrupidse, 1902, p. 

 3, regards Bradijcinetus as a subgenus of At hy reus, which, according 

 to his own definitions of Athyreus, will not hold good. He distin- 

 guishes Athyreus and Bradycinetus from Bolboceras by having the 

 intermediate coxae separated by " toute la largeur du raesosternum, 

 qui est aussi large que long." This is of course not the case in the 

 species of Bradycinetus, in which the intermediate intercoxal pro- 

 cess is longer than broad and always narrower between than behind 

 the coxse, the latter separated by about one-fourth or one-half of 

 the process in its widest part beliind the coxse. The intermediate 

 coxse in Bolboceras are " contigues ou separees seulement par la 

 pointe du mesosternum, ou alors mesosternura etroit, plus long que 

 large." It is very evident that the author has not examined any of 

 the species of Bradycinetus, which is to be regretted as in a work 

 like "Genera Insectorum " such mistakes could and should have 

 been avoided. Bradycinetus is much more closely related to Bolbo- 

 ceras than it is to Athyreus; the general form, different intermediate 

 intercoxal process, scutellum and other characters separate Athyreus 

 readily from Bradycinetus and Bolboceras, while the difference be- 

 tween the last two genera is only slight. A close study of the one- 

 hundred and thirty nine species enumerated by Boucomont may 

 even show that Bradycinetus is not distinct from Bolboceras, whicii 

 I am rather inclined to believe, as the width of the intermediate 

 intercoxal process in Bradycellus carinatus, described below, is 

 already narrower between the coxse than in the other species. For 

 the present I keep the genus distinct till a critical study of all the 

 species is made, which can only be done by those possessing suffi- 

 cient material of the foreign species. 



Bolboceras farctum and var. tumefactum have the intermediate 

 coxal process between the coxie elevated into a tooth -like elevation, 



TEANS. AM. ENT. SOC. XXXII. (32) AUGUST, 1906. 



