June, 1908.] Proceedings of the Society. 121 



The proceedings of October 15 and November 19 were read and approved. 



On motion of Mr. Southwick, Mr. J. II. Stebbins, 3 West 29th St., was elected 

 an active member of the society. 



Mr. Frank Watson, through Mr. Davis, proposed as an active member Mr. John 

 H. Cook, 12 McPherson Terrace, Albany, New York. 



Professor Raymond C. Osburn, of Barnard College, spoke concerning "The 

 Syrphidae of Iliitish Columbia." Among other things he described the striking 

 structural characters of the family which are found in the venation of the 

 shape of head and abdomen and character of the antenna;. He spoke also of the 

 mimetic forms of which there are a large number. The Syrphidoe are world wide in 

 their distribution. About 2,500 species are so far known, but the tangled synonymy 

 leaves the exact number in doubt. Verral lists 800 species from Europe and Aldrich 

 in his list gives 680 species for all of North America. In 1886 Williston gave 300 

 species for the United States and Canada but many have been added since. It is 

 likely that nearly 1,000 species may be accredited to the whole of North America. 



In the summer of 1901 and 1902 Professor Osburn collected in Priti>li Colombia 

 mainly about the southwest portion of Vancouver Island and incidently at Glacier, in 

 the Selkirk Mts. In 1904, with the assistance of Mr. Harvey, he published a list 

 of the Syrphidae obtained by the latter, since which time he has received a consider- 

 able amount of new material from Mr. Harvey and others, and Dr. Dyar and Mr. 

 Caudell in 1905 brought back some 41 species as a result of their collecting in British 

 Columbia. Of these six or seven are new species. Of the 50 Syrphidae more or 

 less sent in by Mr. Harvey since the publication of the first list, six are new. Pro- 

 fessor Osburn has examined all of the Syrphidae in the National Museum and has 

 altogether a list of 130 species from British Columbia. He spoke of the richness 

 of the territory entomologically considered, of the great abundance of (lowers 

 upon the pollen of which the majority of the Syrphidae love to feast, of the delights 

 of collecting all through British Columbia. In regard to the distribution he said that 

 nearly a fourth of the 130 species known from British Columbia are circumpolar. 

 The remainder are about equally divided between those known only from the west 

 and those which are also recorded from eastern North America and spreading clear 

 across Canada and British Columbia. He found quite a number of forms that had 

 spread north from California. He exhibited the new species of Syrphidae fiom 

 British Columbia, descriptions of which will soon appear in the Canadian Entomolo- 

 gist. Among the other important species shown were Syrpkus quinqutlimbatu 

 Helophilus poreusVi alker and Brachypalpus parvus Willist., none of which has been 

 recorded since they were described. S. quinquelimbatits was described in 1884 from 

 southern California, //. poreus in 1849 from the Hudson Day Territory and />'. 

 in 1886 from Colorado. Forms which have recently acquired considerable economic 

 importance are Cheilosia alaskensis Hunter and Cheilosia hoodiana Bigot, the larvae 

 of which have recently been shown by Burke to be the cause of the timber dis 

 the northwest affecting conifers and especially the western hemlock. 



Professor John B. Smith took issue with Professor Osburn on the geographical 

 range of insects from British Columbia, since he had found in the study of tl 

 tuidae that there were almost no circumpolar forms and that the Noctuidae from Van- 

 couver region showed no southern California forms among them, but this launal 



