Insecutor Inscitiae Menstruus 



Vol. X JULY-SEPTEMBER, 1922 Nos, 7-9 



THE SPECIES OF PSOROPHORA OF THE 

 CILIATA GROUP 



{Dipt era, Culicidae) 

 By HARRISON G. DYAR 



Psorophora ciliata Fab. is a well-known species in North 

 America. Its large size and remarkable shaggy legs at once 

 arrest attention. The species is wholly predaceous in the larval 

 state, subsisting upon the larvae of other mosquitoes, such as 

 occur in transient rain-pools in warmer, open country, which 

 while not arid, is dry enough so that the puddles are more 

 commonly dried up than water-filled. The species occurs 

 throughout eastern North America east of the plains, the 

 northernmost record being Plattsburgh, New York, the south- 

 ernmost, Tampico, Mexico, although Theobald records it from 

 British Honduras. For a long time it was not considered that 

 more than one species existed in this group, although it was 

 known that a similar form occurred in the Argentine Republic. 

 This has been called also ciliata, irrespective of the wide trop- 

 ical gap between the two. 



Recent investigation has convinced me that the group is 

 better represented in the Argentine country than with us. 

 We have only ciliata and the doubtful species ctites, which 

 though differing at first sight strikingly by the absence of the 

 ciliations, appears to differ in no other character. However, 

 thanks to Mons. E. Seguy of the Paris Museum of Natural 

 History, who has sent me material for naming, and to Dr. 

 Juana Petrocchi of Buenos Aires, who has also sent specimens, 

 it becomes evident that there are four distinct species in the 



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