_ The species is very common throughout the State, and, doubt- 
ss, throughout the country at large, but it has been noticed in its re- 
ion to grass and corn only in an article in my Thirteenth Report 
Oe). 
No serious attempts have been made to determine the history of 
this species, but the following data from our scattered notes concerning 
the time of occurrence of its various stages are worthy of permanent 
record. 
In hothouse and other indoor cultures it may continue to breed 
and grow the winter through. January 8, 1889, imagos were observed 
2 flying about a flower pot in my office which contained growing corn 
and wheat, and January 18 one fly was found with a string of sey- 
eral eggs yet attached to her ovipositor. On the same day nearly full- 
grown larve and pup were found a little below the surface of the earth 
in the pot. Pupz were noticed again February 11, these having come 
from larve previously noticed feeding on rotting grains of corn. Feb. 
4, 1892, larve of this species were received from Mr. Benjamin Buck- 
~ man, of Farmingdale, Illinois, with the statement that they had mined 
nearly all his flower bulbs. The adult fly, he says, “seems to be a small 
fly or gnat, as this has been quite numerous about the pots all winter.” 
= The larva was first brought to my notice as a corn insect in May, 
~ 1883, through Dr. Boardman ‘of Stark county, who forwarded specimens 
to my office with the information that this insect was destroying newly 
_ planted corn in that county by eating out the substance of the germ, 
sometimes as many as three or four larve to a single kernel. The field 
had been to pasture previously—partly blue grass and partly timothy. 
Other fields of the neighborhood were abundantly infested, but only 
_ where the ground had been in grass the preceding year. 
May 30, 1883, the same larva was observed at Towanda, McLean 
— county, abundantly infesting corn on old sod, and other similar ob- 
servations were made to July 10 of that year. 
Description. Egg —tLeneth, .31 mm. Oval, white, smooth, slightly 
_ flattened at the ends when they are pressed one against another. Ex- 
__truded by the female in strings. 
— Larva.—The larva is cylindrical, smooth, white, except the head, 
which is jet-black. The body is divided into twelve segments, not in- 
_ eluding the head, the three anterior of which are shortest, and are fre- 
quently somewhat retracted within each other. The terminal segment 
of the body is bent abruptly downward beyond the middle and con- 
stricted before the tip. The body is soft and flexible, and the move- 
ments of the maggot are sluggish. 
The head, viewed from above, is broad-ovate in outline, narrowing 
forwards, and somewhat abruptly rounded-in front. It is smooth and 
shining, about as long as the first segment, within which it is frequently 
more or less retracted. Its width is about three fourths its length. The 
entire larva is one third of an inch in length when full grown, and about 
one fortieth of an inch in transverse diameter, and of nearly uniform | 
size throughout, only the first two or three segments being slightly nar- 
Pia 
Y 
