168 



Eev. T. A. Marshall writes us that E. Andre, of Beaune, is now en- 

 gaged in compiling a new catalogue of the Hymenoptera of Euroj^e and 

 adjacent countries, every part of which will be submitted to specialists 

 before publication, and which doubtless will for a time prove serviceable 

 to working Hymenopterists. 



The Buhach Producing and Manufacturing Company, of Stockton, 

 Cal., very generously offered to sell the Department some time ago 

 seed of Pyretlirum cinerariafoUum, at the following rates: One pound, 

 $50; 5 pounds, $200; 10 pounds, $350; 50 pounds, $1,250; which 

 shows that there is money in the cultivation of this insecticide plant 

 in the United States. We have already shown that the plant can be 

 successfully grown over a large portion of the country and it seems 

 remarkable that this firm should have enjoyed a monopoly so long. 



We are anxious to get copies of our First and Sixth Reports on the 

 Insects of Missouri. We shall be pleased to purchase them of any of 

 our readers who happen to have copies that they can spare. We desire 

 these two reports more particularly. The first is published in the Re- 

 port of the State Board of Agriculture for 1808, and we will purchase 

 copies of that report where the entomological part is not separated. 

 The Sixth Entomological Report was published separately. We are also 

 willing to purchase the entomological reports for any other years. 



THE HABITS OF THALESSA AND TREMEX. 



By C. V. Riley. 

 HABITS OF THALESSA. 



Our two largest American Ichueumonids {Thalessa atrata and T. hma- 

 tor) have long been known to bore the trunks of various trees with their 

 lengthy ovipositors, choosing, apparently, only trees or stumps inhab- 

 ited by Tremex or other wood-boriug larvte, from which the general sup 

 l)osition has been that the larvne of the Ichueumonids were parasitic 

 upon the larvas of the Tremex. Accurate and positive observations on 

 this point, however, seem not to have been made, or at least not to have 

 been recorded, prior to our own, which will presently be quoted. 



Harris (lus. inj. to Veg., p. 538) says of the larva of Tremex columoa : 



It is often destroyed by the maggots of two kinds of icbuenmou Hies (Pi)»jj/a atrata 

 and lunator of Fabricius). These flies may frequently be seen thrusting their slender 

 borers, measuring 3 or 4 inches in length, into the trunks of trees inhabited by the 

 grubs of the Tremex, and by other wood-eating insects ; and, like the female Tremex, 

 they sometimes become fastened to the trees and die without being able to draw their 

 borers out again. 



