THE GENUS PISSODES AND ITS IMPORTANCE IN FORESTRY. 25 
IV. The Genus Pissodes and its Importance in Forestry. By 
R. Stewart MacDoucatt, M.A., B.Se., Lecturer on 
Entomology, Royal Botanic Garden, Edinburgh. 
During my insect-huntings of the last several year, I have 
repeatedly had opportunities of observing the species of the above 
genus at their destructive work in woods and forests. In my 
work amongst its members, more than once it has occurred to me 
that if the insects belonging to the genus Pissodes were better 
known to British foresters, it might chance that observation 
would prove that in Britain there are really more than the two, 
or at most three, species which our British coleopterists admit as 
found in this country. It is interesting to me to know that at 
least one other worker in entomology shares this suspicion. 
With a view, therefore, of familiarising the forester with the 
life-history, appearance, and habits of the Pissodes, I purpose 
giving an account of the species—British and Continental— 
which have proved themselves of forest importance. 
In this account—keeping in view the hope that it may be the 
means of stimulating search among the members of the Arbori- 
cultural Society favourably situated for observation, so that if no 
species new to Britain be found, at least a better knowledge of the 
distribution of the admitted species may result—I will give 
minute descriptions of the form and appearance of the various 
insects, sufficient to enable any searcher to recognise a species 
when found. 
PosiTION OF THE PIssODES IN THE INSECT WORLD. 
The Pissodes is a genus of insects belonging to the great order 
Coleoptera, or beetles. The beetles are divided up into four 
sections, according to the number of joints in the tarsus,' and the 
Pissodes are classed in the section pseudo-tetramera (falsely four- 
jointed), in which the tarsi are really five-jointed. The fourth 
joint, however, is so small—requiring a good hand-lens or a 
1 On examination, the leg of an insect is found to be attached to the thorax 
by a part called the coxa. The coxa is followed by a short joint, the 
trochanter, this by a strong femur, then a thinner tibia, and lastly comes 
the tarsus, with a varying number of joints. The tarsus generally ends 
in a claw. 
