180 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



off skin of this coating of dust in order to re-clothe its naked- 

 ness. The imago is not unlike our figure of the pitchy-footed 

 Pirates above, in general appearance. 



Phymdla erdsa of Fabricius, or the eroded Phymata, 

 (figure 54,) (the generic name is derived from the 

 Greek phyma, a swelling or tumor and was applied to 

 this genus on account of their enlarged anterior feet,) 

 belongs to the family Tingidce of Westwood, and is 

 unlike most of its congeners a friend of the cultivator. It is 

 pale green, with dark brown head, thorax and hemelytra, the 

 terminal joint of the antennje elongated and swollen, of the 

 same color, and a band across the widest part of the abdomen. 

 The head is indented before with a deep longitudinal groove on 

 its upper surface ; three similar grooves on the thorax, as if 

 gnawed by the teeth of a small animal, give it the trivial name 

 of erosa or gnawed ; the abdomen is angularly dilated behind 

 the middle and not covered by the wings, and the tibiee of the 

 anterior pair of feet enormously enlarged, the curved tarsi fitted 

 to their circumference when folded. The specimens in the State 

 Cabinet vary in length from .30 to .40 and in breadth of the 

 abdomen across the dilation from .15 to .22. These insects have 

 been taken in great numbers upon the linden trees in the city of 

 Boston, and were seen in the act of devouring the Aphides 

 wMiicli have infested the shade trees of this city for several 

 years past. They are described by a gentleman who watched 

 their operations with great interest, as " stealing up to a louse, 

 cooly seizing and tucking it under t!ie arm, then inserting the 

 beak and sucking it dry." They are supposed to feed also on 

 other vegetable-eating insects as well as the plant louse. 



The Order Diptera, or two-winged insects, containing the 

 moscpiitos, gnats and flies, is distinguit^hcd from all otiiers, by 

 the apparent absence of the posterior wings ; the place of these 

 is supplied, however, by two small fiKments clubbed at the tip, 

 called haltercs, poisers, or balancers, while the fore-wings are 

 fully developed in most of the species, and ])crform all the 

 functions of both. They are in general furnished with a 

 fleshy proboscis, containing various pointed and barl)ed piercing 

 instruments, and their tarsi are composed of five articles or 

 joints. Their habits are extremely various, and their number 

 beyond computation. Some pass their larva and pupa stages 

 beneath the water, like the Neiirojdera ; as, for instance, the 



