54 PLANT-BUGS INJURIOUS TO COTTON BOLLS. 



adults — 10 females and 9 males — in confinement at the laboratory 

 at Dallas furnished some data on the subject. Shortly after the 

 middle of November no more food was provided and dead leaves 

 were put in with the bugs in the lantern-globe breeding cages which 

 were in an open shelter protected only from rain. The lot included 

 a specimen (female) which became adult on August 14, and one 

 which became adult on August 16 (male), 2 females which were 

 collected at Clarendon, Tex., on September 19, and 8 males and 6 

 females collected at Barstow, Tex., on October 13. On December 

 1 all were alive; on December 19, when next noted, all w^ere alive 

 except one of each sex collected on October 13; on January 17 one 

 of the same lot was observed crawling in a cage, the others being 

 hidden in the leaves, while on March 8 an examination showed that 15 

 were dead and 4 had escaped during the writer's two months' absence 

 from the laboratory. Whether or not these four specimens which 

 escaped survived the winter is of course unknown, but as they left 

 the cage after January 1 it may be presumed that they were more 

 vigorous than the others. Perhaps in the field the bugs are capable 

 of finding more suitable hibernating conditions than were provided. 



In general, Pentatomids hibernate among dead weeds, in crevices 

 under the loose bark of posts and trees, and in rubbish of various 

 kinds. Uhler's green plant-bug is reported^ to burrow in loose soil 

 for the purpose of hibernating, and a similar observation^ has been 

 made in the case of the predaceous bug Podisus serieventris Uhl. 

 Doubtless many Pentatomids, like other insects, attempt to hibernate 

 in places where thair chances of surviving the winter are slight, and 

 it seems doubtful that Pentatomids which bury into the soil often 

 survive the winter except where there is little or no rainfall. 



Pentatomids are among the earliest insects to emerge from hiber- 

 nation in the spring, although apparently only a small percentage 

 passes the hibernating period successfully. Both sexes hibernate 

 in many, if not in all, species. Kegarding the appearance of the 

 conchuela in the spring at Tlahualilo, Mr. J. P. Conduit, under date 

 of March 10, 1906, in a letter to the writer says: '^In spite of the cold 

 weather we have had, the conchuela is still with us, and two or three 

 live ones have already been picked up in various places." In north- 

 ern Mexico and western Texas the first eggs are probably deposited 

 shortly after the average daily mean temperature becomes con- 

 stantly above 70° F. Ordinarily, this would occur early in April. 

 The slow rate of production, however, in April and May temperature 

 seems to prevent a large increase in numbers of the insects before 

 June 1. 



a BuL 57, South Dak. Exp. Sta., p. 40, 1898. 



& The Gypsy Moth, by Edward H. Forbush and Charles H. Fernald, Mass. Board of 

 Agr., 1896, p. 403. 



