66 General Notes. [January, 
with stiff, yellowish hairs. Tubercles also surmounted by yellow- 
ish hairs. Underside dull greenish-brown, darker brown on the 
segments under the lateral fold—AProf. C. H. Fernald, State Col- 
lege, Orono, Maine. 
SUPPLEMENTARY NOTE ON THE Foon OF THE BLUE-BIRD.— When 
my paper on the food of the blue-bird was prepared for the Sep- 
tember and October numbers of the Eztomo/logist, I had no mate- 
rial illustrating the food of the species for the months between 
July and December, except two stomachs taken in September, the 
contents of which were so far exceptional that I excluded them 
from the table of the food. Since the publication of that paper 
I have studied the food of the blue-bird in August and September, 
and find the record for those months so different from that of the | 
months preceding that an exact idea of the economical relations 
of the species cannot be given without taking it into account. 
Twelve specimens were obtained in August at Normal, Ill.— 
three early in the month and the others on the 29th and 30th. 
The blue-birds were at this time most abundant in meadows and 
pastures, and the contents of their stomachs indicate that the 
chief business of the month was the pursuit of locusts, crickets 
and grasshoppers, moths and caterpillars. 
The Orthoptera eaten by these birds amounted to fifty-eight 
per cent. of their food, and the Lepidoptera to twenty-seven per 
cent. About half of the former were Gryllide (Gryllus and 
Nemobius), and the remaining half were equally Locustide and 
Acridide (Xiphidium fasctatum and ensifer, Caloptenus femur- 
rubrum and bivittatus and Cidipoda sordida). 
Half of the Lepidoptera were unrecognizable moths, and the 
remainder caterpillars, five per cent. being -Noctuide. Ants 
were about one per cent. of the food, Coleoptera only five per 
cent. (including three per cent. Harpalidze), Cydnide (Cwnus delia) 
one per cent., and spiders six per cent. A few wild cherries and 
elder berries were the only fruits taken. The beneficial elements 
thus amount to about nine or ten per cent. of the food, and the 
injurious elements to about eighty-five per cent. 
_ All but one of the ten specimens upon which the account of 
the September food is based, were shot at Normal, and all but 
two on the twenty-ninth of the month. The chief peculiarity of 
the month is the almost total disappearance of Coleoptera , which 
_were represented only by a few small Harpalids and a single 
minute Atznius. The Lepidotera rise to thirty-seven per cent. 
chiefly through the abundance of the larva of Prodenia lineatella 
arvey. The Orthoptera make just half the food, the species 
differing from those of the preceding month mainly in the 
_ greater number of red-legged locusts. Spiders were only two 
per cent. of the food, and some unknown wild fruits formed seven 
per cent. oe 
It will be seen that a striking change in the food of this species 
attends the increase of the Orthoptera in numbers and activity, 
