DISCUSSION OF GENERA AND SPECIES 



27 



Habit. Adult entirely destitute of secretionary covering. The color 

 is extremely variable, some specimens being very dark and others quite 

 pale, this variation depending in part upon actual variability, in part upon 

 the amount of weathering undergone before collection and in part upon 

 the age of the insect at the time of death. In all specimens, however, 

 there is a pair of black, eye-like spots at the anterior end of the body, 

 a character that seems effectually to mark the species. 



Fig. 12. Kermes nigropunctatus Ehrh. : A, anal lobes and anal ring of adult female ; 

 B, wax duct. From specimen from Quercus wislizeni, on the Santa Cruz 

 Peninsula. 



In form (Fig. 95) the adult somewhat resembles K. cockerelli, but 

 the intersegmental constrictions are much shallower and the insect is only 

 slightly gibbous. 



Morphological characteristics. In specimens in the last instar, but 

 taken before the chitinization of the derm has begun, the anal lobes 

 (Fig. \2A) appear as a pair of heavily chitinized, wart-like prominences, 

 each of which bears many slender setae. The anal ring is borne at the 

 inner end of a short invagination, is heavily chitinized, somewhat funnel- 

 shaped, and bears no setae. The dorsum bears a few stout, sharply point- 

 ed spines. The tubular ducts are few and small, of the form shown in 

 Fig. 125 and are scattered over the body, not being arranged in a ventral 

 zone as in K. cockerelli. The groups of circular pores found on the 

 venter of the latter species are lacking in K. nigropunctatus. Antennae 

 and legs as in cockerelli. 



Immature stages not seen. 



Notes : I consider Kermes essigi King to be identical with K. nigropunctatus. 

 I have at hand specimens from what is possibly the type lot of the former species 

 and am unable to detect any differences between the two. In this opinion Mr. 

 Ehrhorn concurs. Furthermore if certain specimens at hand purporting to be K. 

 branagani King are correctly determined this species too is a synonym of nigro- 

 punctatus- 



