NATURAL LOCALITIES OF BRITISH COLEOPTERA. 3) 
and withered trunks: the wood-boring beetles, however (both 
perfect insects and larvee), bore holes into the solid wood and 
open it up to the rain and air; as by this means it becomes more 
and more rotten, other insects take possession of it, and finally, 
by the combined influences of the atmosphere and its insect- 
destroyers, the trunk is reduced to a pulp that serves as a 
manure for the young trees that are ready to take its place. In 
our country we are not likely to suffer from any such block to 
vegetation, for in these days every bit of wood seems to be re- 
moved as soon as it falls. Hven in the New Forest or in Sherwood 
it is a rare thing to come across a trunk that has been left long 
enough for the beetles to take possession of it. It is very 
tantalising to hear collectors speak of the times when the trunks 
were allowed to le year after year as they fell, affording them a 
rich harvest of species that we are now delighted to find a 
single specimen of in a day’s, or even a week’s, hunting. There 
is, however, a great deal that may yet be done, and the wood- 
beetles, even the rarest of them, are by no means extinct, and 
only require another indefatigable collector like Charles Turner 
to bring them forth again to the hght. 
The loose bark of fallen trees affords a very good hybernating 
place for many species of Carabide, Staphylinide, &e. I 
remember, as a beginner, taking a great quantity of Anchomeni 
and others in this way on the banks of a pond near Repton; 
many species also hybernate in the crevices and under the bark 
of standing trees. I have found Hrirhinus vorax and many 
other species in profusion under willow-bark in winter. 
The true bark and wood beetles may be divided into several 
classes :— 
Some live between the bark and solid wood; these are 
usually flat species, admirably adapted by their structure for the 
narrow space into which they have to squeeze themselves : such 
are Dendrophagus, Brontes, Pytho, Pediacus, Ips, Cerylon, Homa- 
lota plana, Prognatha quadricorne, and many others; several 
Hemiptera, too, as Aneurus levis and Aradus depressus, are 
equally well suited for this their natural habitat. 
Other species like places where the wood is rotten underneath 
the bark, where the bark, in fact, is loose, and affords a rain- 
proof covering to the rotten tinder-wood underneath ; such bark 
should be carefully removed and shaken over a sheet, and the 
