146 APID^. 



5. Coelioxys vectis. 



C. atra, capite thoraceque pallide villosis ; scutello utrinque dentato, 

 margine postico rotundato ; abdominis segmentis utrinque macula 

 tomentosa alba ornatis. 



Coelioxys vectis, Curtis, Brit. Ent. viii. 349, pi. 349 <$ $ . 



Smith, Zool. iii.1152 ; Bees Great Brit. 150. 



Thorns. Hym. Scand. ii. 275. 

 Coelioxys temporalis, Nyland. Notis. ur Sallsk. pro Faun, et Flo. 



Fenn. i. 253. 

 Coelioxys conoidea, Gerst. Stett. ent. Zeits. (1869) 169. 



Foerst. Verhandl. Freuss. Rheinl. x. 273. 

 Coelioxys punctata, St.-Farg. Hym. ii. 520. 



Female. Length 6-6^ lines. — Jet-black ; the head and thorax closely 

 and strongly punctured ; the sides of the face densely clothed with 

 white pubescence that has usually more or less of a yellow tint ; 

 the pubescence on the clypeus of the same colour, but very short 

 and downy ; on its anterior margin it is fulvous. Thorax — the 

 pubescence white ; the posterior margin of the scutellum rounded 

 and armed laterally with a slightly incurved spine. Abdomen 

 shining, the basal segment with a quadrate patch of snow-white 

 pubescence laterally which extends to the base of the second segment; 

 at the basal margins of the third, fourth, fifth, and sixth segments 

 laterally an elongate angular patch of snow-white pubescence ; the 

 apical segment lanceolate, shorter than the ventral plate, which is 

 also lanceolate and more acute at the apex than the upper plate. 

 (See PI. IX. figs. 2 i, 2 k, 3 I.) B.M. 



Male. — Yery closely resembling the female, the abdomen being 

 similarly spotted with snow-white pubescence ; the lateral angles 

 of the apical margin of the fifth segment produced into a short 

 acute tooth ; the sixth segment has a longer tooth at its basal 

 lateral margin ; the apex with two bifurcate processes, the upper 

 teeth shorter and less acute than the lower ones ; beneath, the 

 fourth segment has a notch in the middle of its apical margin ; the 

 basal segment with a spot of white pubescence in the middle, the 

 following having a subinterrupted fascia. B.M. 



This species is referred by Dr. Gerstaecker to the Anihophora co- 

 noidea of Illiger, who in describing the species very briefly from a 

 male insect, gives it as var. y. minor of Kirby's Apis conica : this 

 variety, on examining Kirby's type, is found to be a male of C. 

 elongata. It may possibly be the O. conoidea of Klug, described in 

 Germar's ' Eeise nach Dalmatien ; ' but its identification with Illi- 

 ger's imperfectly described species is impossible. Curtis's name is 

 therefore retained, his beautiful figure at once distinguishing it 

 from all other species of the genus. This insect is the largest 

 species of the genus found in Great Britain ; it is local, but has been 

 taken plentifully in Sandown Bay, Isle of Wight, on flowers of the 

 bramble ; it is parasitic on Megachile maritima. Other localities 

 known are Shirley Common, Wimbledon Common, Lowestoft, and 

 Morthoe, North Devon. 



