Pee RN ey ae Oe toa Ae ee 
by Hi i 
eighteen lots of ants taken in company with this root louse shows that 
Lasius niger has been so taken fifteen times, and the following species 
once each: Lasius mixtus, Formica fusca gagales, and Solenopsis debilis. 
During the winter and early spring these lice have been found wandering 
in the burrows of Lasius niger, still guarded and cared for by the ants. 
The five known forms of this insect are as follows: the egg, wing- 
less pseudogyne or viviparous female, pupa, winged pseudogyne, and the 
wingless sexed form, consisting of true oviparous females and of mates. 
The eges have been found in spring, from which the young root lice have 
hatched in the first part of April. These are viviparous, and give birth 
to another generation of the same kind, and successive generations fol- 
low during the entire summer. Young have been taken in nearly every 
collection here during the summer months. 
In the fall, usually in October and November, the viviparous form 
gives birth to true sexed individuals, males and oviparous females. ‘These 
copulate and the females lay their eggs in the loose earth around the 
roots of plants in the ant burrows in which they are kept. ‘The ants 
keep these eggs during the winter and spring, and from them in due 
time the young viviparous root lice hatch. ‘Thus the circle of life con- 
tinues. It is shown, however, by our collections that some of the lice 
also live during the winter on the roots of plants, in the formicaries of 
ants, most of these being viviparous and young; but the oviparous 
form sometimes occurs there during the winter or very early part of 
the spring. 
DESCRIPTION.* 
This plant louse is closely allied to certain species commonly placed 
in 'l'yehea, a genus of the Rhizobimme, which is a subfamily whose mem- 
bers have not hitherto been known to acquire wings. A careful study 
of the winged individual bred from a pupa shows that it is a new gencric 
type most nearly related to Hormaphis, of the Pemphigine ; and as 
Tychea seems to contain at least two dissimilar groups of species, whose 
only bond of union is a resemblance in the number and length of the 
antennal joints, it will be well to divide the genus, retaining the old 
name for the typical species, such as phaseoli and brevicornis, and plac- 
ing selarwe and its allies together with the present species at the foot of 
the Pemphigine, as a new genus, for which the name Geoica is now 
proposed. Tere also belongs the species described by Buckton as Hndeis 
carnosa, Which surely is not an Endeis at all. Tychea panict, Thos., is 
apparently a young Rhizobius. 
GEOCIAT n. gen. 
Antenne 5-jointed, not annulated, first and second joints short, 
third longest, fourth and fifth shorter, subequal, often connate, the fifth 
with a short thick spur at tip. Sensoria present on the third antennal 
joint of the winged individual, and in all of the forms at the apex of 
the fourth joint and base of spur on fifth, the latter sensorium lunate 
in the wingless individuals. None present on the tibix of the oviparous 
a 
Bey CyeAn Part. 
+ Ge, earth; oikos, house. 
