COLEOFTERA 185 



southern regions, according to Delpino ('Ult.oss.,'Atti Soc. ital. sc. nat.,Milano, xi, 1868, 

 xii, 1869), some flowers of this kind, e.g. Magnolia, are even exclusively adapted to 

 pollination by beetles (Cetonia). Lastly, we sometimes find beetles upon flowers 

 which offer none of the advantages above described, but only seem to allure by 

 means of their bright colours : thus, for instance, Cryptocephalus sericeus and 

 C. Moraei are often attracted by the vivid yellow blossoms of Genista 

 tinctoria. 



A review of the habits of beetles which visit flowers, and of the families to 

 which they belong, shows continuous gradations from forms which never visit 

 flowers to those which partly nourish themselves on flower-food, and finally to 

 those which entirely depend upon it. This shows clearly that insects which were 

 not originally anthophilous gradually became more and more habituated to flower- 

 food, and only acquired structural adaptations fitting them to successfully obtain 

 such food after coming to depend upon it entirely. 



But few beetle larvae maintain themselves on flower-food (Helodes aucta, 

 Meligethes). Other beetles, which as larvae ravage flowers, e.g. the apple-blossom 

 weevil (Anthonomus pomorum), leave them at once on attaining to the perfect 

 state. Among beetles which are anthophilous when adult, the larvae may be 

 carnivorous (Telephorus, Trichodes, Coccinella), or may devour putrid animal 

 matter (Dermestidae), or feed on living or decaying vegetable matter (Buprestidae, 

 Cerambycidae, Elateridae, Chrysomelidae, Curculionidae, Cistela, Lagria, IMordellidae, 

 Lamellicornia). 



Of the carnivorous larvae mentioned, most species of Coccinella and Telephorus 

 retain their predaceous habits when adult, but some (Coccinella septempunctata, 

 punctata, and mutabilis; Telephorus fuscus and melanurus; and others), though 

 they do not disdain flesh altogether, resort more or less to flowers, while the adult 

 Trichodes entirely abandons the carnivorous habit and becomes purely anthophilous. 



Of the larvae mentioned which feed upon putrefying animal matter, Dermestes 

 retains this habit when adult, never visiting flowers, and this is also sometimes the 

 case with Anthrenus and Attagenus. But the same species of the last two genera, 

 which under favourable circumstances (e. g. in neglected zoological collections) may 

 feed for many generations on animal matter, without even leaving the cases whose 

 contents they are destroying, in other circumstances may be found by hundreds upon 

 flowers, busily feeding upon pollen and nectar. 



The most perfect series of gradations in anthophily is found, however, in those 

 families where the larvae feed upon vegetable matter, as the following selection will 

 show. No species of Bostrichidae is to be found on flowers : of Curculionidae only 

 a very small minority resort exceptionally to flowers; either those of the same 

 plants on which they have developed (Gymnetron campanulae, Larinus Jaceae and 

 senilis^), or of other plants on which exposed nectar is to be found (e.g. Otiorhynchus 

 picipes on Cornus, species of Apion on Adoxa and Chrysosplenium): the Chrysomelidae, 



* Herm. Miiller found larvae and pupae of Larinus senilis F. at Muhlberg in Thuringia at the 

 base of the capitula of Carlina acaulis, and the perfect insect on the leaves, and now and then on 

 the flowers of the same plant. 



