THE PINE SESIAN. 729 



* Dr. Kellicott has added the following observations on this -^gerian 

 borer : 



On the larval po'iod of Harmonia pint, and a parasite of satne. — The original descrip- 

 tion of this luoth, together with the facts, so far as known, in its history, were pub- 

 lished in the Canadian Entomologist, vol. xiii, 1885. The last week in June of this 

 year I had an opportunity to visit the "old homestead " in Oswego County, N. Y., 

 where I obtained a limited number of imagines and certain additional facts pertain- 

 ing to its preparatory stages ; these I present for the consideration of this club, 

 together with specimens of the moth, the pitch masses in which the pujise form, with 

 pupa shells protruding, and a dipterous fly parasite of the species. 



I have elsewhere (Canadian Entomologist xiii, 157) shown that the larva does not 

 transform until at least two years old ; I think now that I have evidence that it 

 does not change until the third year. The facts are these: In June, 1883, two pitch 

 exudations on a small piue were marked ; these were fresh and were supposed to con- 

 tain larvse one year old and which would probably give moths in June 1884. Accord- 

 ingly, I made arrangements for having the same cut out and sent to me at Buffalo in 

 May, 1884. The plan failed, however, and, as it turned out, the oversight led to good 

 results. On revisiting the spot in June of this year I at once identified the pitch 

 cocoons marked in June, 18S3, then one year old, and on examining them I could find 

 no reason for thinking that moths escaped from them in 1884. On opening one of them 

 a live chrysalid was found within ; the other was cut out with an axe and on July 6th 

 gave a moth, now in my collection. 



These facts do not amount to demonstration, although to me they indicate a high 

 degree of probability that the life-period of this ..Egerian is completed the third year. 

 For, by way of application, the fully formed pitch masses of June, 1883, were caused 

 by larvae hatched in 1882, since the images of 1883 were just appearing, and had moths 

 issued in 1684 the opening, pupa shell, and pupa cell would have been easily seen until 

 1885. It is scarcely possible that eggs were laid in 1883 from Avhich larvae occupied 

 these masses formed by a previous generation or by some other animal. On examina- 

 tion of scores of examples I have failed to find traces of any other insect in the pitch, 

 at least such as could cause the exudation. Pinipestis zimmerman^ii causes somewhat 

 similar formations, bat they are readily separated from those of the .^gerian. 



The egg and the very young larvaj have not been seen by me; the former is evi- 

 dently dejiosited near a wound in the tree, the young not being able to penetrate 

 the outer bark of the pine trunk. They rarely occupy branches and have not been 

 found in small trunks, i. e., from three to five years' growth ; on the other hand they 

 prefer young pines from 6 inches to a foot in diameter, especially such as have 

 grown up when the original pine forests have been mostly removed. 



For obvious reasons larvae boring into woody stems or the roots of trees or shrubs 

 are well protected from insect parasites. A few references occur, however, to in- 

 stances of hyraenopterous parasites of our wood-boring ^gerian larvae; one, Phwogenes 

 ater, parasitic in Podosesia syringw, has been noticed by G. H. French, Papilio i, 106, 

 and another, an Ichneumon, in the same, by Herbert Osborn, Papilio ii, 71. Thus far 

 I have found no mention of a dipterous parasite of any of our species of the group. 

 The two-winged fly exhibited with the examples of Harmonia pini escaped from a 

 pupa of the same and is a parasite of the same. May 30, 1885, at Portage, N. Y,, I 

 removed a mass of pitch that proved to contain a pupa ; it was kept in a proper box 

 when it soon lost its motion and the puparium of the fly was observed within its shell. 

 The fly appeared June 20, It has been sent to Dr, C. V. Riley for identification, 

 but it was not in his collection and it was not specifically identified ; it is a species 

 of Tachina. I am at a loss to understand, knowing the larval habits imiierfectly, how 

 the fly can possibly deposit its egg upon the moth larva, as it lives continuously, as 

 I suppose, within the pitch. There must be some means of obtaining air, and possi- 



* Entomologica Americana, vol. i, 1885. 



