THE SHOVEL-NOSED LEAFHOPPER. 67 
downward with a peculiar sawing motion alternating with a slight 
pause for the deposition of an egg. 
“The eggs are one and one-half millimeters by one-third millimeter, 
cylindrical, gradually tapering from a point near the head back to an 
obtusely rounded tip; the anterior end is cut off obliquely from one 
side and rounded from the other, coming to an obtuse point. They 
are deposited in a continuous row, from 30 to 50, side by side, curv- 
ing slightly around the stem with their heads toward the edge of the 
sheath, from which they are distant about one-third the circumfer- 
ence. The time occupied in actual deposition is from 20 to 40 minutes, 
but the selection of a location and the catching of a sheath edge often 
occupy several hours. 
‘“‘Although the eggs were deposited through a period of two weeks 
or more they apparently all hatched at about the same time; the 
time evidently depending considerably upon favorable conditions of 
temperature and moisture, for, up to July 2, no larve had been 
observed either in the cages or in the field. On this afternoon the air 
was very oppressive, and remained so until cleared by a heavy 
thunder storm during the following night. On the morning of the 
3d they were observed just emerging from the eggs in the cage, and 
examinations showed that they had hatched in the field also. The 
earliest deposition from which they were observed to issue on this 
date was made May 23, and the latest on June 9, while the majority 
were deposited June 4 and 5. This gives from 26 to 38 days, with 
an average of about 1: month, as the period of incubation. 
“The freshly hatched larve have shorter and blunter heads than 
the adults, and are much more active, but within a week or two the 
head has elongated, and it has adopted the sluggish habit of the 
adult. 
“Upon hatching, the larve immediately arrange themselves along 
the base and margins of the broad leaves parallel to the veins, where 
they remain stationary for weeks at a time, so closely resembling the 
rust spots and discolorations occasioned by their punctures that the 
chance of their detection is slight, or they ascend to the head, where 
they conceal themselves so effectually among the glumes and sheaths 
upon which they feed that one might carefully examine a head and 
pronounce it free from them, only to find, on shaking it violently, 
that it contained a whole colony. Here they stay until the head 
ripens in September, when they descend to feed on the second growth 
and the surrounding grasses until winter, when they crawl into the 
thick clump of the Elymus and hibernate, appearing again in early 
May and changing to pupe. From then on until the middle of the 
month they feed on any green plant, near enough to be reached, 
crawling at last to the top of some blade of grass and issuing as adults 
over 10 months from the time of hatching from eggs. 
