REPORT OF THE STATE ENTOMOLOGIST I914 



245 



Rhopalomyia capitata Felt 



1908 Felt, E. P. N. Y. State Mus. Bui. 124, p. 363, 364 



1909 Ottawa Nat., 22: 247 



This rather large species appears to be qmte abundant in some 

 localities. It seems to have a pronounced gregarious habit judging 

 from the large number of galls on limited patches of Solidago 

 serotina and S. canadensis. The galls attain full devel- 

 opment from the middle till the latter part of September, the insects 

 appearing in considerable numbers shortly thereafter, as many as 

 62 being reared in one day from a lot of galls. A Tachinid, 

 Dichaetaneura leucoptera Johns., determined by its 

 describer, was reared September 7, 1906 from this gall and presum- 

 ably from this species. - 



Gall. The terminal rosette galls produced by this species are 

 about 2.5 cm in diameter and composed of numerous small cells, 

 each surrounded by a few leaflets about one-fourth the normal size 

 and the entire mass is provided with a calyxlike whorl of longer 

 leaflets. The length of the leaflets around the individual cells and 

 the mass appears to be very naturally correlated with the degree of 

 infestation, since the more populous heads have shorter leaflets. 

 The individual galls occur at the base of the deformity among the 

 leaflets, are somewhat conical in shape, about 4 mm high, 2 mm in 

 diameter and not very unlike the gall ofR. racemicola. See 

 plate 10, figure 2 ; plate 13, figures 1,2, and also New York Museum 

 Bulletin 175, plate i, figure i, for a colored illustration. 



Male. Length 2.5 mm. Antennae as long as the body, sparsely 



Fig. 59 Rhopalomyia capitata; fifth antennal segment of male, 



enlarged (original) 



