382 Canadian Record of Science. 



are great lovers of heat, their favourite localities being 

 sunny hillsides, where they live in holes and crevices in 

 the soil, or beneath stones or clods of earth. 



Harris in his "Insects Injurious to Vegetation," says: — 

 " Where crickets abound, they do great injury to vegeta- 

 tion, eating the most tender parts of plants, and even 

 devouring roots and fruits, whenever they can get at them. 

 Melons, squashes, and even potatoes, are often eaten by 

 them, and tbe quantity of grass that they destroy must be 

 great, from the immense numbers of these insects which 

 are sometimes seen in our meadows and fields." 



Our largest species is Gryllus luctuosus, Serv. It may be 

 easily distinguished from our other species " by the great 

 length of the wings, which, surpassing in length the wing- 

 covers, hang over the extremity of the abdomen." (Scudder.) 

 It seems to be very rare in Canada ; I found two females in 

 August, on Montreal mountain, some years since. It is 

 recorded from Nova Scotia by Walker. 



Gryllus Neglectus, Scudder, is our commonest species. 

 Specimens of it in the larval condition may be found under 

 stones as soon as the snow has melted in spring, and 

 towards the end of May many of them have attained the 

 perfect condition and may be heard shrilling; but some 

 individuals are later, as I have taken an adult female and a 

 specimen in the pupa state beneath the same stone on June 

 4th, 1885. 



I have not been able to ascertain whether these hyber- 

 nated specimens live until the end of the season or deposit 

 eggs during early summer and then die, but so far as I have 

 observed, their shrilling entirely ceases during July. In 

 the beginning of August a few may be heard, and by the 

 middle of the month they are again in full chorus, appear- 

 ing to be more numerous than in the earlier part of the 

 season. Packard says that they have been known to lay 

 300 eggs, glued together in a common mass. I have exam- 

 ined freshly laid clusters but did not observe that they were 

 glued together, but the moisture with which they are coated 

 may act as a cement when dry. 



Province of Quebec, very common. — Provancher. Mont- 



