IX. SOME ENEMIES OF THE ORTHOPTERA. 



(a) Larra Americana (Fox), and Her Crickets. 



The first specimen of this species which I chanced upon was dig- 

 ging her nest on the edge of a small precipice at the bottom of 

 which lay three crickets, all kicking violently, one even almost able 

 to crawl away. Her manner of d'lgging was peculiar among the 

 solitary wasps I have seen. While she proceeded in part by scratch- 

 ing the dirt back under her much like Pompilus and with equal 

 vigor and nervousness, she pushed out the loads she accumulated 

 in a different manner. Other wasps use chiefly their hind legs and 

 abdomen; but this specimen used her head and front legs, im- 

 provising of these a kind of scraper. To take on a load of sand 

 the wasp stretched out her legs, lay down flat and pushed her head 

 in the sand and backed out. On account of this method of digging, 

 the burrow resulting was wide and low, so as to make room for the 

 outstretched legs. 



There was something wrong with this individual of L. Amer- 

 icana. She soon lost interest in her work, ran around looking into 

 other nests and other holes in the ground. She acted in a most 

 demented manner. Her visits to her old nests and to her crickets 

 became fewer and fewer and she finally remained away altogether. 



]\ry second specimen I followed to her nest on the nearly vertical 

 bank of a creek near Austin. She was carrying a large cricket in 

 her mandibles and was moving along in jumps of a yard or more. 

 She alighted at the bottom of the embankment and walked up its 

 steep side entering a large hole, from the further end of which she 

 had dug her nest. In this way T saw her carry in four crickets 

 of various sizes. Two days later I found the nest closed with earth, 

 though not quite to its mouth. I dug up this nest as well as another 

 close by and found both to have been of about the same shape and 

 dimensions. A tunnel five-sixteenths inch in diameter ran into the 

 embankment at a slight inclination downward for a distance of 

 four inches. It ended in a dilatation, one of the pockets of the 

 nest. Just in front of this the tunnel branched off for a slight dis- 

 tance and lead into another pocket which was the larger as well 



