10 BULLETIN NO. 2, ENTOMOLOGICAL DIVISION. 
but hard to capture on account of their activity.*. No locusts except 
natives and a few C. spretus not yet fledged. 
Noticed to day for the first time the possibility of the common Prickly 
Pear or Leaf Cactus being insectivorous ina measure. When anything 
touches the stamens while spread, they all close very quickly and retain 
it within their grasp until a peculiar viscid secretion is ejected. 
July 3.—Visited again the bad-lands in quest of the above-mentioned 
Cicindelidz, and succeeded in obtaining a few additional specimens. 
As noticed before, they were very hard to capture. 
On the 4th saw a few locusts in the air—not more than two dozen. 
They were flying north. : 
DESCRIPTION OF THE COUNTRY AT AND ABOUT FORT BUFORD. 
The surface at Buford is quite level. and is covered well with grasses. 
A few miles (varying from two to three) back from the river the surface 
becomes rolling, and gradually very rough and almost destitute of veg- 
etation, forming what is known in this vicinity as “‘bad-lands.” There 
were locusts at this locality during the summer of 1878, though in what — 
numbers and particulars of dights I was unable to learn. AJso in 1873. 
Bad-lands comprise the water-worn edge of a hgh plateau that ex- | 
tends northwest and southeast for several hundred miles. This plateau 
is well grassed and watered during the fore part of summer, and affords 
an excellent breeding ground for various species of locusts. In the fall 
of the year, and even in late summer, this entire country can be burned 
over. 
On approaching Mouse River Valley the bad-land feature is again 
presented, and forms the eastern escarpment to this plateau— Plateau 
du Coteau du Missouri.” Of course spring burning could be very suc- 
cessfully done here, especially if the growth standing was that of two 
or more years. That Caloptenus spretus does occasionally breed over this 
entire region in great numbers there can be no doubt, but that it is not 
a permanent place of multiplication seems evident from the data obtained 
while at Fort Buford. 
In reference to the possibility of this insect continuing to breed in 
this locality from year to year, or for an indefinite period, I must con- 
fess that I cannot see why it could not, unless it be in the variability 
of humidity during different seasons. 
After leaving Buford the surface along the Missouri River differs but 
little from that farther down the river, sometimes widening into exten- 
sive and fertile valleys, and at other places closely hemmed in by the 
towering buttes and water-worn hills. The Missouri winds its way 
through bad-lands or plateaus, the edges of which are “ bad-lands.” 
The formation of which the surface deposits of this section of country 
are composed is that of a vast shallow inland sea at times, and at others 
* Cicindela cinctipennis Lec. 
. 
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