Oct., '06] ENTOMOLOGICAL NEWS. 297 



NOTE ON BIONOMICS. 



I can offer no extensive, contribution to our knowledge of the 

 habits of the subspecies. I present here a few special notes 

 made at the time of collecting. "Although the district in which 

 the flies were taken contains some game, including eland 

 (Oreas canna livingstonei) , kudu (Strepsiceros kada), roan 

 antelope (Hippotragus equinns), the duyker (Cephalolophus 

 grimmi) and Speke's tragelaph (Limnotragus spekei), yet I 

 believe that human blood forms the greater part of their food. 

 This is undoubtedly true over at least a part of the 'belt/ Along 

 the right bank of the lower Katumbela from a place called 

 Esupua to a point half a day's march up the river there lies the 

 great Benguella caravan route near which there is little or no 

 big game and over which constantly pass great caravans of 

 half-naked Bantu rubber, slave and ivory traders. At Esupua 

 one may see half a dozen of these large caravans camping in 

 one place. It is here that the flies are most plentiful. They 

 hide in the tall grass and sedges near the river, also on stones, 

 trunks of trees and vines, and among the leaves of the low trees 

 on the bank. When a native is sent to the river for water the 

 flies rise from their resting places as he passes and follow 

 him seeking for an opportunity to bite. On several different 

 occasions I followed natives going to the river to fetch water. 

 One of these was bitten twice, three were bitten once each, and 

 seven were not bitten at all. The Bantus say the bite is pain- 

 ful, and I noticed that if a fly settled on a porter's back the man 

 always slapped himself as it began to insert its probosces. 

 Some of the specimens I took had abdomens greatly distended 

 with blood. The flies do not always remain so close to the river. 

 The first one I saw was between three and four hundred yards 

 from the river in thin 'desert' bush, consisting of Acacia 

 reficiens and other thorny shrubs which afford practically no 

 shade. I do not believe Gl. palpalis wellmani shares the dislike 

 for human ordure which has been ascribed to its congeners. I 

 have frequently seen it in and around the filthiest native camps 

 at some distance from the river where it had evidently gone for 

 the purpose of sucking human blood. I have made no observa- 

 tions on the life history. I dissected an incomplete larva out 



