A HISTORY OF SUFFOLK 



ICHNEUMONIDAE 



Of this extremely interesting family, the species of which are often large and brightly coloured, 

 always preying upon insects of all orders, as well as upon spiders and false-scorpions, there were 

 I,i86 different kinds known in Britain in 1872, which number had risen to 1,719 in 1901, when 

 my paper upon the subject was read before the Entomological Society. The determination of these 

 insects, however, is fraught with so much difficulty that the family has been almost entirely neglected 

 in our isles, with the consequence that in Suffolk there have been but few observers. Paget, Curtis, 

 and Rev. E. N. Bloomfield have recorded a very few of the commoner and more striking kinds ; 

 there are one or two in the British Museum found about Lowestoft by F. Smith ; and others 

 have been noticed by Bedwell, Tuck, and Ransom. In my Ichneumons of Britain '^ I have recorded 

 a goodly number of the first two sub-families from the county ; and in working upon my second 

 volume I have noticed many Cryptids ; but the remaining three sub-families are very poorly repre- 

 sented, because, although I possess some thousands of Suffolk specimens, opportunity has not yet 

 been found for working out the correct names of the great majority. Hence we find that but little 

 over four hundred species can with accuracy be referred to in the following precis, which, as nothing 

 has at present appeared upon the general subject, is dealt with in some detail. 



Taking the five sub-families in their usual order, we find among the Ichneumoninae Hoplis- 

 menus alhifrom has been captured on flowers at Walberswick and Brandon ; Automalm alboguttatus 

 from Bury St. Edmunds, in the late Mr. Alfred Beaumont's collection ; that we can include the 

 tawny Tragus lutorim, on the strength of specimens bred from poplar hawk-moths at Yarmouth by 

 Paget and from Delephila galii by Mr. Peek at Aldeburgh, with T. exaltatorius and Protichneumon 

 fuscipennis on the Rev. A. H. Wratislaw's authority ; P. laminatorius is a common parasite of the 

 elephant hawk-moth at Ipswich and Sudbury, and was once bred from the bedstraw hawk at Alde- 

 burgh. Coelichneumon Uneator is sometimes found in the Bentley Woods, C. liocnemis at Brantham and 

 C. castaneiventris at Ipswich and Assington ; while of the genus Stenichneumon, S. trilineatus is very 

 often seen hibernating beneath the bark of pine and aspen trees in winter, and swept from 

 reeds in the Southwold marshes. Cratkhneumon rufifrons is common in the Bentley Woods, Staver- 

 ton Thicks, and Brandon ; C nigritarius was recorded from Covehithe at the end of June by Curtis 

 and is still not rare on the undergrowth in our woods ; C. fabricator and C. annulator are abundant 

 everywhere in the late spring, and I have found C . fiigltivus at Ipswich with the variable C. coruscator. 

 The Rev. A. H. Wratislaw took C. Gravenhorsti near Bury St. Edmunds, and both C. lanius and 

 C. varipes occur on low bushes in the Bentley Woods, though the latter is certainly rare there. 

 Melan'uhneumon leucomelas has been taken by Bedwell at Oulton Broad, Flatten in Ipswich, and 

 Beaumont near Bury ; the marsh-frequenting M, bimaculatorius was swept by Elliott at Covehithe 

 Broad in October 1900 ; I have found M. saturatorius in the same place, as well as at Brandon, 

 Af. perscrutator on carrot flowers at Tuddenham, and the rare M. sangtdnator once flying in the 

 sunshine at Bentley in July. Of the genus Barlchneumon we can claim B. anator, B. vesti- 

 gator, and B. derogatory which have been found about Bury by Mr. Tuck ; B. incubitor and B. 

 lepidus from Tuddenham Fen in August ; B. angustulus from Copdock by Hocking, and B. albi- 

 cinctus is common in marshy places at Ipswich and Barton Mills ; Tuck has, moreover, once 

 captured B. hilunulatus in Finborough Park. We next come to the long and difficult typical genus 

 Ichneumon, which comprises over fifty British kinds, and of which we only have /. xanthorius at 

 Tostock, Bentley, and Ipswich, often at roots of Aira caapltoia in the winter; /. sarcitoriui, common 

 at Claydon, Aldeburgh, Lowestoft, Ipswich, Barham, and Westleton, upon flowers in August and 

 September ; a female of the very rare /. /autatorius was once found by Bedwell on the sandhills at 

 Kessingland. I.latrator and I.subquadratus are common among grass in the winter, and the males in 

 autumn on flower-heads ; /. mo/itorius has been found at Sproughton, Foxhall and, Paget says, 

 commonly about Gorleston ; /. suspiciosus at Tostock, Bramford, and Henstead on Angelica blossoms, 

 and /. extensorius is common everywhere ; but of /. primatorius only one male example has occurred 

 to me upon the flower of Angelica sylvestris in Barnby Broad, and at the end of August 1 902, I 

 took the first British specimen of /. gradarius (which I have since that time received from Ireland) 

 from the same kind of flowers in Tuddenham Fen. 



Chasmias motatorius is abundant in grass-tufts and beneath pine bark in the winter, and its 

 males are found on flowers in September ; the linear Limerodes arctiventris is occasionally found 

 among marram grass and Matricaria on the coast at Lowestoft and Southwold. I have bred 

 Ctenichneumon castigator at Ipswich in 1893, and Beaumont has obtained C.funereus from the Rev. A. 

 H. Wratislaw's collection, found about Bury St. Edmunds. In the British Museum is an example of 

 C. messorius from Suffolk, where C. divisorius is widely distributed and to be seen on various flowers 

 in August. Spilichneumon occisorius occurs at roots of grass in the Bentley Woods in winter; but the 



" Claude Morley, F.E.S., &c., Ichneumonoloffa Britannica (2 vols. 1903 and 1907 ; vol. iii in Press). 



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