138 



Forty-third Report on the State Museum. 



[42] 



Prionidus cristatus (Linn.)* 



The Nine-pronged Wheel-hug. 



(Ord. Hemiptera: Fam. Reduvid^.) 



Cimex cristatus Linn^us: in Amoen. Acad,, vi, 1763, p. 399, 42; Cent. Ins. 

 rar. 1763, p. 16, 42. 



A number of peculiar-looking insects surrounding the eggs from 

 which they had apparently but recently emerged, were received for 

 indication of name, habits, and food, from Burlington, N. J., where 

 they had been found on a " copper beech " — a variety of the Euro- 

 pean beech, Fagus sylvatica, having a crimson purple foliage. 



They were true bugs of the order of Hemiptera (Heteroptera), and 

 belonging to the family of Reduvidce. They were quite young, being 



Fig. 19.— The nine-pronged wheel-bug, Peionidus cristatus, in its young and mature 

 forms ; also, its hexagonal egg-mass, eggs enlarged to show their flask-shape, and an 

 egg giving out the larva. 



in their first larval stage. As at this period the members of this and 



allied groups differ greatly from their mature forms, I was unable to 



refer them positively to the " wheel-bug," Prionidus cristatus (Linn.), but 



without much doubt they were of that species. The eggs from which 



* Mr. Uhler, in his Gheck-list of the Hemiptera- Heteroptera of North America, has pro- 

 posed for this species the generic name of Prionidus, on the ground that the Pnonotus, 

 of Laporte, is preoccupied. 



