8 PROCEEDINGS OF THE NATIONAL MUSEUM vol. 73 



HADRURUS HIRSUTUS Wood 

 GIANT HAIRY SCORPION 



This species (pi. 1, fig. 1) is our largest and most distinctive 

 species. The region in front of the ocular tubercle is very white 

 and in live specimens shows up in sharp relief the lateral ocelli giving 

 the scorpion the appearance of having a face. The body as a whole 

 is a dark yellowish or reddish brown. The appendages and the post- 

 abdomen are very hairy, hence the name hirsutus. Some of the 

 alcoholic specimens in the National Museum collection measure over 

 11 cm. in length. Many specimens are much smaller, and in desert 

 situations they are scarcely more than half this size. These, however, 

 should be regarded as a distinct variety. 



This large araclmid is foimd in many places in southwestern 

 United States and northwestern Mexico. National Museum speci- 

 mens are from Nevada, Arizona, and California, in the United 

 States, and Sonora and Lower California, Mexico. Pocock (1902) 

 questionably reports the species from Guatemala and mentions " two 

 smaller examples for which no locality is known," which probably 

 should be referred to the variety to be described farther on in this 

 paper. The writer obtained a live overwintering female specimen 

 of this species at Tucson, Ariz., March 27, 1927, and has kept her in 

 captivity up to the time of writing this paper, July, 1927. Between 

 April 27 and May 19 she ate three large roaches, two being adults of 

 Periplaneta americana. Since that time she has refused to eat. The 

 specimen at once excavated a pit in the earth at the bottom of the 

 breeding cell and occupied it at all times afterward. 



HADRURUS HIRSUTUS, var. ARIZONENSIS, new 



In the desert regions about Phoenix and Tempe, Ariz., there occurs 

 a scorpion that should be regarded as only a variety of hirsutus. It 

 is smaller, less hairy, and the color of the appendages and legs is 

 a light yellowish, while the abdomen is almost black. 



Length, varying from 4 to 7 cm. 



Type locality. — Papago Saguaro National Monument, Ariz. 



Type.—C^t. No. 971, U.S.N.M. 



Four specimens obtained, all by the writer; three, including the 

 type, from under stones, Papago Saguaro National Monument, Ariz., 

 March 31, 1927, and one (kept alive) from Tempe, Ariz., March 29, 

 1927. 



This live individual was taken from under a stone in a rocky 

 place at Tempe, Ariz. It was a female specimen much distended, 

 apparently with developing eggs. She was placed in a museum jar 

 and carried about all the way to the Pacific coast and back to Wash- 

 ington, D. C. On April 26 I arrived at Washington and placed her 



