CATALOGUE OF INSECTS. 



543 



Super-family V PROCTOTRYPOIDEA. 



With this series begin the parasitic species, a large proportion of which are 

 directly beneficial because of their habit of feeding in or on the tissues of 

 injurious species. As a whole these parasitic forms are known by having the 

 trochanter or hip segment of the hind legs made up of two parts ; but this is a 

 character so difficult of detection on the usually small species that it is, on the 

 whole, safer to class all very small specimens of this order as members of a 

 parasitic series. In this super-family we find the very smallest of the Hyme- 

 noptera, and all of them are parasitic so far as I know. They infest not only 

 larvae but adults and even eggs of other insects, forming thus a most important 

 check to the increase of the host insects. In this series the ovipositor is 

 retractile into and comes from the tip of the abdomen. 



Our collections are decidedly poor, and the list is in consequence very incom- 

 plete. No special collecting has ever been done in the State, and breeders of 

 insects of other orders have usually permitted the escape of the parasites bred 

 by them incidentally. 



Family L PELECINIDiE. 



PELECINTJS Latr. 



P. polyturator Dru. Occurs 

 throughout the State 

 quite commonly. This 

 is a lemarkable insect, 

 the female of which has 

 a body nearly two inches 

 long, made up of a few 

 long, slender segments. 

 The male is very rare 

 and utterly unlike the 

 female, resembling more 

 nearly a wasp than a parasite 



Fig. 259 — Pelecinus polyturator ; male and female 



Family LI HELORIDiE. 



HELORUS Latr. 

 H. paradoxus Prov. New York (Ashm). 



