118 MISC. PUBLICATION 174, TJ.S. DEPT. OF AGEICULTUEE 



REVIEW OF LITERATURE 



Walker described Dicyclus aeneus in 1833 from specimens col- 

 lected on grass near London, England, and Westwood named 

 the species as type of the genus in 1840. Dicyclus fuscicomis 

 Walker was described from the Isle of Wight in the same paper 

 in which the description of the genotype species appeared. Both 

 species were more fully described by Walker in his Monographia 

 Chalciditum in 1839. Cunliffe in 1921 recorded D. fuscicomis as 

 parasitic upon Ocinella frit (Linnaeus) in England, and in 1930 

 Imms published a paper giving observations on some parasites of 

 the frit fly in England, in which he fully described and figured the 

 same species but placed it in the genus Halticoptera instead of 

 Dicyclus. 



In 1894 Ashmead described Cyrtogaster liqueatus from one speci- 

 men said to have been reared from Phloeosinus dentatus Say, a 

 scolytid. Two years later Ashmead described Cyrtogaster occiden- 

 talis from specimens taken in Indiana, Texas, District of Columbia, 

 Virginia, South Dakota, and Colorado, with the further statement 

 that the species had been reared by F. M. Webster from Oscinis 

 variabilis Loew, 0. carbonaria Loew, or 0. umbrosa Loew mining 

 stems of wheat, and in 1903 this record was repeated by Webster 

 with the substitution of O. soror Macquart for 0. variabilis. In 

 the same paper in which Cyrtogaster occidentalis was described, 

 Ashmead also gave descriptions of C. citripes and Polycyrtus flori- 

 danus from specimens collected in Florida. In one of his privately 

 published pamphlets printed in 1917, Girault placed C. occidentalism 

 C. citripes, and P. ftoridanus in synonymy with C . liqueatus Ash- 

 mead. He also cited P. foersteri Crawford, described from speci- 

 mens reared from Agromyza angulata Loew, as a synonym of the 

 same species. 



In 1916 Luginbill and Urbahns recorded rearing Cyrtogaster occi- 

 dentalis from the corn leaf miner, C erodonta dorsalis Loew, at Yuma, 

 Ariz., Tulare, Calif., Columbia, S.C., Lakeland, Fla., and Green- 

 wood, Miss. These authors gave a very fair figure of the adult 

 female. The following year Seamans recorded the same species as 

 parasitic upon Cerodonta femoralis Meigen in Montana. In 1920 

 J. M. Aldrich mentioned the Webster record of Cyrtogaster occi- 

 dentalis as a parasite of the w-heat stem miner in a paper dealing 

 with Oscinella frit. Frost in 1924 repeated the record by Crawford 

 of Polycystus foersteri from Agromyza angulata, and in 1928 Miss 

 Griswold recorded the rearing of Cyrtogaster liqueatus from Phy- 

 tomyza delphiniae Frost. 



In 1920 James Waterston sent to the writer for examination a fe- 

 male and a male pteromalid reared from the frit fly in England. He 

 had identified the female as D. fuscicomis Walker but was uncertain 

 regarding the relationship of the male and also as to the proper 

 generic placement for the Walkerian species. A specimen of fusci- 

 comis (probably a cotype) identified by Walker was included in the 

 sending. The reared specimens were apparently a part of the ma- 

 terial upon which the record later published by Cunliffe was based. 

 The agreement of the reared female with Walker's specimen of 

 fuscicomis was found to be exact, and the fact that the male repre- 



