Dec. 1918 Bulletin of the Brooklyn Entomological Society 117 
On the 7th of February I went up to the same place by way of 
Bailey Cafion, the type locality of Pleocoma australis. There 
was one hole of this species in the soft dirt at the side of the trail, 
but it was empty, I did not see another hole. This species must 
have a very limited distribution. On the Mt. Wilson trail I 
found one fine female of P. badia. Besides the specimens which 
I took Mr. Fall and Mr. Martin took between them six females 
and one male. Mr. Fall also dug out a larva from the bank at 
the side of the trail. The females of Pleocoma sometimes leave 
their burrows to dig new ones. The burrows from which they 
first emerge are clean and round, with no dirt thrown up, and 
extend straight down for at least fifteen inches and probably 
deeper. Those which they dig after leaving their first burrow 
are about four inches deep and covered with dirt in a little heap. 
Probably the beetles do their traveling at night. The males I 
took were half frozen and very quiet, but the females were very 
lively, and I kept a couple of them alive for a short time. 
When I got home I let them dig. They work their front legs 
as if they were swimming, the toothed tibiz pushing the dirt back, 
and the head and thorax are moved rapidly, up and down, pack- 
ing the sides of the burrow solidly. When I turned the beetles 
on their backs they were helpless. They could not turn over. 
Their wings are tiny stubs and they seem unable to move either 
the wings or the elytra except to pull them tight to the body. I 
had heard that Scarabaeide smelled with the antenne, so I got 
all the strong smelling things I could think of, such as acetic acid, 
vinegar, ether, chloroform, etc. ; to all of these the beetles paid no 
attention until the antennze. were actually touched, and then they 
frantically tried to rub the antennz clean with the forelegs. 
The eggs have not been found, but one female which I dis- 
sected contained about fifty. They are light yellow, oval, about 
one mmm. long. 
The larva did not seem to differ much from Osten Sacken’s 
description. 
These beetles are very local, only having been collected in a 
place about one half mile in diameter on Mt. Wilson. I have 
‘found some elytra of P. badia in the feces of some kind of animal 
on the north side of Strawberry Peak, about six miles in a 
