26 



in the usual position in the groove of the rostrum, but the insect, 

 after inserting the setae into the tissue of the plant, either folds the 

 rostrum directly back, freeing the set?e entirety from it, or doubles 

 it up in the form of the letter '* Z," the upper angle representing the 

 joint between the first and second, and the lower angle that between 

 the second and third segments. At the latter joint the setae remain 

 in the groove. AMien feeding, the bug constant^ raises and lowers its 

 head. When the setae are entirely withdrawn from the boll, the spine, 

 located on the inner side of a fore tibia slightly beyond the middle, 

 is used to replace them in the rostral groove. The setae are pressed 

 into place by one stroke of the tibia. 



These insects have been observed to feed upon a cotton boll for ten 

 minutes without withdrawing their setae. One adult under observa- 

 tion in the field visited four bolls, two on each of two plants in two 

 days, and remained for over thirty-six hours on the last of the four 

 bolls. Another adult bug remained on the same boll for two and 

 three-fourths days. Three remained on the same plant for over 

 thirty hours, and three others were found on the same plant thirty- 

 two hours after they were first recorded. In none of these cases was 

 it known how long the insects had been on these plants previous to 

 their being first noted. They do not always remain so long, but have 

 been observed to alight for but a few minutes on a cotton plant and 

 then fly to another without feeding. 



In cages in the field during the middle of the da^^ the insects are 

 more restless and are more frequentty seen crawling about on the 

 screens; after sundown they are usually found quietly feeding. 



Flight. — '\Mien liberated in a room the adults fly readily and inva- 

 riabty nearly straight toward the light. In the field their direction 

 of flight is usually curving and the greatest distance obtained in any 

 of six flights observed and recorded was 25 feet. In four successive 

 flights from the hand, held at a height of -^ feet from the ground, 

 an adult female covered on an average 15f feet per flight. An adult 

 male, apparently in normal condition, taken when feeding on a boll, 

 in attempting to fly from the hand dropped directly to the ground. 

 It is probable that these records are not indicative of the distance 

 which these bugs are capable of flying when newly matured. 



Gregariousness. — It very frequently happens that more than one 

 conchuela is present on a plant, even though no others can be found 

 on plants for a considerable distance in any direction. The belief 

 that this gregariousness is not due to the adults found on a plant 

 having developed from eggs laid on that plant is supported by the 

 fact that careful search failed to reveal the remains of the ^gg batch, 

 by the fact that adults under observation did not remain on the same 

 plant in any case for as long as three days, and also by the frequently 

 noted occurrence of two or three adults appearing at nearly the same 



