1 8 8 2 .] Entomology. 915 



Telenomus, infesting the eggs of the notorious squash-bug (Co- 

 reus tristis). She writes : •' The eggs of the Coreus have been 

 very abundant on our squash and melon vines, but fully ninety 

 per cent, of them, thus far [August 2] have been parasitized— the 

 only thing that has saved the plants from utter destruction." 



On the Biology of Gonatopus pilosus Thorns. — Professor 

 Josef Mik in the September number of the Wiener Entomolo- 

 gische Zeitung (pp. 215-221, PI. in) gives a most interesting ac- 

 count of the life- history of the curious Proctotrupid, Gonatopus 

 pilosus Thorns., which has not before been thoroughly understood. 

 Perris in his Nonvcllcs excursions dans les grandes Landes tells 

 how from cocoons of parasitic larva? on Athysanus maritima (a 

 Cicadellid) he bred Gonatopus pedestris, but this he considered a 

 secondary parasite, from the fact that it issued from an inner co- 

 coon. It appears from the observations of Mik, however, that it 

 was in all probability a primary parasite, as with the species stud- 

 ied by the latter (G. pilosus) the larv 1 spins both an outer and an 

 inner cocoon. The larva of Gonatopus pilosus is an external par- 

 asite upon the Cicadellid Deltocc; ' Fieb. The 

 eggs are laid in June or July, and the larvae, attaching themselves 

 at the junction of two abdominal segments, feed upon the juices 

 of their host. But one parasite is found upon a single Cicadellid 

 and it occasionally shifts its position from one part of the abdo- 

 men to another. Leaving its host in September, it spins a deli- 

 cate double cocoon in which it remains all winter in the larva 

 state, transforming to pupa in May, and issuing as an imago in 



It will be remembered that the female in the genus Gonatopus 

 is furnished with a very remarkable modification of the claws of 

 the front tarsi, which are very strongly developed, and differ 

 somewhat in shape in the different species. It has usually been 

 supposed that these claws were for the purpose of grasping prey, 

 but Professor Mik offers the more satisfactory explanation that 

 they are for the purpose of grasping the Cicadellids, and holding 

 them during the act of oviposition. 



It is interesting to note that there is in the collection of the 

 Department of Agriculture, a specimen of Amphisccpa hirittata 

 Say, which bears, in the position described above, a parasitic larva 

 similar to that It left its victim and spun a 



white cocoon, but we failed to rear the imago. It is probably the 

 larva of a Gonatopus and possibly that of the only described 

 American species of the genus, Gonatopus contortulus Patton 

 (Can. Ent., xi, p. 64). 



Species of Otiorhynchid/e injurious to Cultivated Plants. 

 — -Of our numerous species of this family, we know the develop- 

 ment and earlier stages of only one species, viz., Fuller's Rose- 

 beetle {Aramigus fuller?). A few other species have attracted 



'Vide Annual Report Department of Agriculture, iS 7 S, p. 257. 



