INSECTS OF THE THORN. 535 



the tip are a few whitish, costal streaks, and at the apex a small, round, dark-brown 

 spot, in a whitish patch, with a circular, dark-brown apical line behind it; cilia, 

 blackish-gray. Hiudwings blackish-gray ; cilia, rather paler. Abdomen blackish, 

 tipped with dull yellow. 



7. Conotrachehis cratcegi Walsh. 

 Order Coleoptera ; family Curculionid^. 



The late B. D. Walsh found this weevil abundant near Rock Island, 

 111., on the hawthorn, also plentifully on the same kind of shrub, near 

 Chicago. (Proc. Bost. Soc. N^at. Hist., ix, 311.) 



The beetle. — Of the size, shape, and sculpture of anaglypticus Say, but differs in the 

 elytra being of a uniform color, mottled with ocher-yellow and white, and in the 

 upper surface of the thorax being whitish, except a large and conspicuous triangular 

 spot at its base, and the anterior margin, which, as well as the inferior surface, ia 

 brown. The second tooth on the femora is obsolete. 



8. The buffalo leaf-hopper. 



Ceresa bubalus Fabr. 



This singular but very common leaf-hopper, according to Fitch, fre- 

 quents the wild thorn, and has been found by Mr, John G. Jack to be 

 positively injurious to young apple and pear trees, as they cut the 

 bark when depositing their eggs. '^ These incisions and the eggs in 

 them were so numerous that in many cases it was impossible to raise 

 tke bark for the purpose of budding the trees. The incisions and eggs 

 are usually most abundant on the south and upper side of the limbs, 

 comparatively few being found on the shady or under sides." They 

 begin depositing their eggs, adds Mr. Jack, at Chateauguay, Quebec, 

 August 12, the process going on until the close of October. 



The eggs, in batches of from live or six to a dozen (rarely more), are deposited 

 obliquely in the bark, and often the incision continues into the wood, if the bark is 

 thin. In this way the bark and wood become fastened together, and will not sepa- 

 rate at any season, and the dark spots in the wood and the rough knotty bark bear 

 evidences of the injuries for many years. 



The eggs are of a dirty transparent white, about 1.5™™ in length, smooth, slightly 

 tapering, and sharply rounded towards the interior end, but tapering much more 

 gradually at the exterior end. Although normally round, the sides are generally 

 found to be more or less flattened by pressure from the tissues of the wood and bark 

 of the tree. So numerous were these eggs on some trees that a careful estimate 

 shows that there must be at least from six to eight hundred eggs in a section of the 

 branches not more than an inch long and half an inch in diameter. 



They hatch during the first week in June. 



A small dipterous egg-parasite has been raised from the eggs by Mr. 

 Jack. 



The following insects also live on the thorn : 

 9. BasilarcMa astyanax (Fabr.). 



10. BasilarcMa arthemis (Drury). 



11. Uranoles melinuSj on C. coccinea and C. apifolia (Scudder). 



