TXTB 



VOL. Ill -slk^i^s.VOL I. NEW YORK, DECEMBER, 1880. 



No, 12. 



PUBLISHED MONTHLY BY 



THE HUB PUBLISHING CO. ok n. v. 



323 Pearl St., New York. 



TERMS Two dollars per annum, in advance. 



EDITED BY 

 CHARLES V. RILEY, Washington, D. C. 



ON THE NATURAL HISTORY OF CERTAIN BEE- 

 PLIES (Bombyliidae).* 



We now come to the interesting and 

 hitherto unrecorded life-history of two 

 species of Bee-flies. On p. 305 of our 

 First Report we figured an undetermined 

 egg-parasite of the Rocky Mountain lo- 

 cust, giving some account of its extensive 

 occurrence in and about the egg-pods of 

 that insect, and showing that next to the 

 Anthomyia Egg-parasite it was the most 

 important enemy of the locustr The lar- 

 va was somewhat anomalous. We were in 

 doubt even as to what order of insects it 

 belonged, placing it at the time in the Hy- 

 menoptera and, with a question, among 

 the Ichneumonidce. From the absence of 

 spiracles on the intermediate abdominal 

 joints we suspected, soon after the publi- 

 cation of our First Report, that this larva 

 would prove to be Dipterous rather than 

 Hymenopterous ; while from such poor 

 descriptions and figures as were extant, 

 that most nearly approached it, we deem- 

 ed it might be Anthracid, and were sub- 

 sequently confirmed in this view by ob- 

 taining, in October, 1879, a single pupa 

 from a lot of larvae sent us by Mr. G. M. 

 Dodge of Glencoe, Neb. Mr. Dodge sent 



us, with the same lot of larvse, what he 

 supposed to be the parent fly, reared from 

 a lot of locust eggs among which the lar- 

 vae were found. His flies, however, prov- 

 ed to be the Anthomyia Egg-parasite {A.aii- 

 gustifrons Meigen, First Report, p. 2S5 1. 

 The single pupa thus obtained from Mr. 

 Dodge's specimen agrees with those of 

 Systcvc/ii/s areas* O. S., presently to be de- 

 scribed. 



During the past two years we have been 

 in correspondence with Prof. J. G. Lem- 

 mon of Sierra Valley, Cal, who has kind- 

 ly sent us many specimens of the locusts 

 occurring there and especially the eggs 



SvsTGiCHUS OREAS : n, larva; b, head, from side; r, do., 

 from front, partly withdrawn into first joint ; </, left mandible ; 

 Cy left maxilla ; _/", prothoracic spiracle ; ^, anal spiracle (after 

 Riley). 



and early stages of Cam/iula pelluiida.\ 



Among such eggs these Bee-fly larvae were, 



if anything, more common than we had 



found them among the eggs of Caloptenus 



spretus east of the mountains. We here 



(juote one letter in illustration : 



i B)- this mail I dispatch another cigar-box filled, 



j this time, with sods containing eggs of the terri- 



j ble locust that for three years past has devastated 



Sierra Vallej' ; also the large, fat, white larva that 



lately made its appearance as a voracious feeder 



upon locust eggs. 



* From advance sheets of the Second Report of the U. S. 

 Entomological Commission. 



* Western Diptera, p. 254; Bull. Hayden's Geo!, and Geogr 

 Survey III., No. 2. 

 t This is the GZdipoda atrox of otir First Report. 



