NOTES ON CULICIDAE. 219 



Japan, India, Ceylon, Philippines, Borneo and perhaps Fiji, male or female specimens 

 from all these countries being in the British Museum collection. Since I can detect 

 no structural differences whatever, I prefer to regard all these specimens as representing 

 a single species, which in different parts of its range is subject to some local variation 

 in size and colour. I can distinguish the three following varieties : — 



(1) vexans, Mg. { = articulatus ^ond., = sylvestris, Theo.). Pale abdominal bands 

 contracted sharply in the middle, or even sometimes divided into a pair of pale spots. 

 Europe and North America. 



(2) stenoetrus, Theo. { = tninuta, Theo., etc.). Pale abdominal bands very httle or 

 even not at all contracted in the middle. Size rather smaller on the average than 

 0. vexans vexans. Oriental Region. 



(3) nipponii, Theo. ( = vagans, Theo. nee Wied.). Size as in 0. vexans vexans, and 

 the basal pale abdominal bands contracted in the same way, but the abdomen has in 

 addition a more or less interrupted pale median dorsal line, and the sixth tergite has a 

 conspicuous apical pale triangle. China and Japan. (This can hardly be Wiedemann's 

 vagans, since he does not mention white rings on the tarsi.) 



Ochlerotatus minutus, Theo. (fig. 7 c). 



A single male has been received from Mlanje, Nyasaland {S. A. Neave), which I 

 think must belong to the type form of minutus, with flat scales over the top of the 

 head ; the specimen is too much rubbed to name with absolute certainty, but if it is 

 correctly associated with the type female from Mashonaland, 0. minutus must be 

 quite a distinct species from 0. tarsalis (see below). The male claspers are very 

 peculiar, and are shown in fig. 7 c ; the only African species which has rather similar 

 claspers is 0. domesticus, Theo. 0. minutus apparently occurs also in West Africa, 

 as females with flat scales on the vertex have been received fron Sierra Leone {Dr. 

 H. E. ArbucJcle) and the Gold Coast (Obuasi, Dr. W. M. Graham, and Bjere, Dr. A. 

 Ingram). The dark bands' on the under side of the abdomen are much broader in this 

 than in the alhed forms. 



Figures of the male claspers of 0. tarsalis, 0. irritans and 0. nigricephalus are given 

 for comparison. It may be mentioned that the claspers of 0. argenteopunctatus and 

 0. punctothoracis are very similar to those of 0. tarsalis, and quite unlike 0. minutus 

 and 0. domesticus. 



Ochlerotatus tarsalis, Newst. (fig. 7 d). 

 Duttonia tarsalis, Newstead, Ann. Trop. Med. i, p. 18 (1907). 

 Duttonia africana, Newstead, Ann. Trop. Med. i, p. 20 (1907). 

 Reedomyia biannulata, Theo., Mon. Cul. iv, p. 263 (1907). 

 Reedomyia neobianmdata, Theo., Mon. Cul. v, p. 255 (1910). 

 Reedomyia bipunctata, Theo., Mon. Cul. v, p. 256 (1910). 

 Neopecomyia uniannulaia, Theo., Mon. Cul. v, p. 261 (1910). 



Most of the above names were previously given by me (Bull. Ent. Res. iii, p. 21) 



as synonyms of 0. minutus, but as stated above I now consider 0. minutus to be a 



distinct species, consequently the commoner form must now be known as 0. tarsalis. 



I do not think there can be much doubt in regard to the synonymy now given. To 



<C325) " ' b2 



