222 REPORT UNITED STATES ENTOMOLOGICAL COMMISSION. 



eggs on September 12. She then coupled again several times, and laid 

 a second time September 17. Under similar conditions she laid alto- 

 gether at six different periods before dying. 



WHERE THE EGGS ARE LAID. 



^' The eggs may be laid in almost any kind of soil, but by preference 

 they are laid in bare, sandy i^laces, especially on high, dry ground, 

 which is tolerably compact and not loose. It is often stated that they 

 are not laid in meadows and pastures, and that hard road-tracks are 

 preferred ; in truth, however, meadows, and pastures, where the grass 

 is closely grazed, are much used for ovipositing by the female, while on 

 well traveled roads she seldom gets time to fulfill the act without being 

 disturbed. Thus a well- traveled road may present the appearance of 

 being perfectly honey-combed with holes, when an examination will 

 show that most of them are unfinished and contain no eggs ; whereas a 

 field covered with grass-stubble may show no signs of such holes and yet 

 abound with eggs.-' In fact, wherever holes are noticed, it may generally 

 be taken for granted that they contain no eggs, for the mother covers 

 well the hole when she has time to properly complete her task. 



'' Furthermore, the insects are more readily noticed at their work along 

 roads and road-sides than in fields, a fact which has also had something 

 to do in forming the popular impression. Newly-plowed land is not 

 liked; it presents too loose a surface; but newly-broken sward is often 

 filled with eggs. Moist or wet ground is generally avoided for the pur- 

 pose under consideration." 



We have noticed that in the Permanent breeding-region, wherever tho 

 vegetation is scant the females show a decided preference for the shaded 

 base of shrubby plants, among the roots of which they like to place 

 their eggs; whereas in the Temporary region, where the vegetation is 

 generally so much ranker, exposed situations, or those comparatively 

 bare of vegetation, are preferred. The experience of 1876 proved very 

 conclusively, also, that they are instinctively guided toward cultivated 

 fields, where the young will find good pasturage; for the eggs were 

 noticeably thickest, and hatched most numerously in 1877 in cultivated 

 areas. In the Cypress Hills region of British America, as Mr. J. G. 

 Kittson informs us, the high lands and protected slopes of the hills are 

 l^referred. The soil of the mountain-region, where the insects perma- 

 nently breed, is mostly of a compact, scantily covered, gravelly nature, 

 and the notion that they lay most in pure sand is an erroneous one. 



Sandy soil that is compact, especially when having a south or east 

 exposure, is much chosen, but in loose and shifting sand the eggs would 

 perish. In 1876, it was generall}^ remarked that the insects were more 

 indifferent than usual in ovipositing, and that eggs were much more 

 frequently laid in low, and even wet, land than in former years. 



The mass seldom reaches more than an inch below the surface, except 

 where some vegetable root has been followed down and devoured, and 



