1919] Hine: Genus Erax 153 



Specimens from Western Kansas and from Arizona. 

 The dorsal red stripe of each femur and the male genitalia 

 are very characteristic of the species. 



Erax interruptus Macquart. 



Length 22 to 27 millimeters. General color brownish, mystax pale 

 with a few black bristles above, palpi with black bristles, beard pale, 

 thorax largely gray pollinose with a wide, dark mid-dorsal stripe nar- 

 rowly divided before. Scutellum with many black bristles on the 

 margin; wings reddish hyaline, legs largely reddish brown, under sides 

 of femora and tibiae dark, nearly black. Abdomen nearly black in 

 ground color, yellowish-gray pollinose spots on the hind corners of the 

 segments, not meeting at the middle on segments one to four, segments 

 five with the posterior margin pollinose, segments six and seven wholly 

 pollinose in the male and each with a small black triangle with the base 

 posterior, in the female. 



This common species is easily known by the furcate male 

 genitalia and the conical oviduct, not compressed as in other 

 species of the genus and about as long as abdominal segments 

 six and seven. See Figure 37. 



It is widely distributed South, reaching from Coast to Coast, 

 from the latitude of Kansas to Gautemala and even further 

 south. It was one of the early North American species 

 described and has had several names applied to it as may be 

 seen in the list of synonyms on a previous page. 



