320 ENTOMOLOGICAL NEWS. [December, 



ON THE LARVAL CASES OF NORTH AMERICAN PSYCHID/E. 



By Harrison G. Dyar. 



For more than fifteen years we have had on our Hsts the names 

 Oiketicus davidsonii, Psyche fragmentella and P. coniferella, de- 

 scribed from the larval cases only. For the sake of simplicity, 

 it would seem advantageous that names of insects should be given 

 to each species in a corresponding stage, preferably the mature 

 form. It is puzzling to students, and introduces unnecessary 

 complications to have names given in other than the final stage, 

 but in the above instances the names have been given, not to any 

 stage of the insect in question, but to the cases made by them in 

 larval life. Still, provided the forms of the cases are characteristic, 

 I would not suggest ignoring these names. It is the object of 

 this paper to determine this matter. 



Oiketicns davidsonii Hy. Edwards. 



This cannot be an Oiketicus. In the species of which the cases 

 are known to me {O. abbotii, O. kirbyi, O. piaiensis), the sticks 

 with which the cases are strengthened are laid on transversely 

 throughout. In this form they are laid longitudinally. The 

 form seems characteristic by the length of the sticks used, some 

 even longer than the case itself. 



Psyche fragmentella Hy. Edwards. 

 cotiiferelia Hy. Edwards. 



From an examination of the cases in the Edwards collection, 

 I am satisfied that these names refer to the same species. The 

 cases are unlike any known to me. From the locality (Sierra 

 Nevada of California) it also seems likely that the species is a 

 good one. I see no reason for regarding it as belonging to the 

 genus Psyche. 



The following table will, perhaps, bring out the characters of 

 the cases of our Psychids with reasonable clearness. Concerning 

 Psyche carbonaria from Texas, nothing is known ; but I do not 

 think that it will prove the same as either of the species men- 

 tioned above. The species which I have referred to the Lacoso- 

 midae are not included. Differing widely in structure of the 

 perfect insect, they differ as much in the plan of structure of the 

 cases. It would be as reasonable to include the case-bearing 

 Microlepidoptera among the Psychidae as these moths. I regard 



