[109J Report of tee State Entomologist. 25l 



As may be seen from the synonymy presented, Kyber, a distinguished 

 anatomist and microscoi^ist, who early in the present century, made 

 valuable researches and discoveries in the Aphides, gave the name of 

 Ajihis hordei to the insect, from the barley on which he found it feed- 

 ing. Later, Kaltenbach, another German naturalist named it Aphis 

 cerealis. More recently, it has been transferred to the genus Siphono- 

 2jhora, in the division that seemed demanded of the Aphidince into separ- 

 ate tribes. Still later, another writer, Mr. Oestlund, in his Sijnopms of 

 the Apjhididce of Minnesota , has transferred all of the Siphonophoras to 

 the genus Nectarophora, assigning as a reason for proposing to rejjlace 

 the familiar name of Siphonophora, that " as a generic term it was 

 already appropriated for the Myriopoda before Koch made use of it 

 in the Aphididce ; and it is also used to denote an order of the Oceanic 

 Hydrozoa, and should, therefore, according to practice, be replaced 

 by one not already occupied." This j^roposed change will not, we 

 think, be accepted, until demanded by a code of laws regulating 

 nomenclature that shall rule authoritatively. 



Its Incomplete Life-history. 



The life-history of the grain aphis is incomplete; the male sex, 

 although a form was described by Curtis as such, is still unknown. 

 The summer form is believed to have an autumnal migration to some 

 other food-plant, as have many of the Aphides, yet it has never been 

 observed. Mr. Walker has affirmed that this sjiecies migrates in 

 autumn from the wheat to several kinds of grass. 



Professor Webster has made some experiments toward ascertaining 

 where the species passes the summer, or until the young wheat 

 appears in the autumn. It was infesting the heads of barley in consider- 

 able numbers, and when the grain was fully ripe and the winged 

 adults ready to forsake the barley heads, he transferred some of them 

 to cages, in which growing timothy, blue grass, and red top had been 

 transplanted. The grasses were kept alive, but the insects died, and 

 no trace of a following generation was observed. {Loc. cit.) 



Buckton had searched the roots of grain in September for its suj)- 

 posed underground habitat at that time, but fruitlessly; nor did he 

 know what became of it during the winter. Since then. Dr. Thomas 

 has been able to add somewhat to our previous sparse knowledge of 

 its life. He found on wheat, in the winter of 1875, an aphis, which, 

 although differing from the descriptions of Fitch and Curtis, he had 

 no doubt was the same species, and he has written of it as follows : 



" When the winter wheat appears above the ground in the fall, it 

 passes from its hiding-place at this time, wherever that may bo. 



