SEEPHOID AND CHALCIDOID PARASITES OF THE HESSIAN FLY 137 



site in North America, and Forbes, as well as Riley, published brief 

 accounts of the receipt of the material and its distribution in Illi- 

 nois, Indiana, Michigan, and Canada. The following year Forbes 

 again mentioned the introduction, stating that he had not succeeded 

 in recovering the parasite from the areas in Illinois where it had 

 been released. In this paper Forbes stated incidentally that Riley 

 had compared specimens of S. nigripes Lindeman with the types of 

 Entedon epigonus Walker in the British Museum and found them 

 to be the same. This seems to have been the first recognition of 

 Lindeman's species as a synonym. The statement by Forbes was 

 confirmed by Riley in his annual report for 1891. 



Many other references to the species occur in the literature of both 

 Europe and North America, but few of these are of much interest. 

 Howard recorded in 1894 a second attempt at introduction of it 

 into North America, specimens received from England having been 

 released in Maryland. The first recovery of the parasite was an- 

 nounced the following year, also by Howard, who stated that a single 

 specimen had been captured in a field at Cecilton, Md., where a 

 part of the imported material had previously been released. In 

 1916 McConnell published a short review of its introduction into 

 this country and cited six localities in Maryland and Pennsylvania 

 where it had been recovered. At the writer's suggestion, McConnell 

 treated the species under the name Pleurotropis epigonus, this 

 being the first recognition of it as belonging in the genus Pleuro- 

 tropis. In 1918 Collin recorded S. nigripes as a parasite of Oscinella 

 frit in England, and the following year Miller discussed it as a 

 factor in the control of the hessian fly in New Zealand. The facts 

 regarding its introduction into North America were again reviewed 

 by Wade and Myers in 1921, and a list was given of 150 localities 

 scattered through 13 States where it had been found up to that time. 



Hans Blunck has recently recorded as Entedon metallicus Nees a 

 parasite reared by him in Pomerania from Mayetiola phalaris 

 Barnes, the identification having been made by L. Biro. 



Most writers have treated this species under the specific name 

 epigonus despite the early synonymizing by Walker of that name 

 with metallicus Nees and despite the fact, also, that the Walker 

 synonymy was accepted as correct by both Dalla Torre and Schmiede- 

 knecht in their catalogs of the Chalcidoidea. No one seems to have 

 given any reason for rejecting the synonymy, even though it has 

 been generally ignored. The writer has been unable to find any- 

 thing in the description by Nees to indicate that metallicus is dif- 

 ferent from epigonus; and since Walker had specimens from Prussia, 

 which he presumably compared with his own types and declared 

 to be the same, there appears to be no good reason why this synonymy 

 should not be accepted and the specific name metallicus be applied 

 to this common parasite of the hessian fly. 



Generically this species conforms much more closely to Pleurotro- 

 pis than it does to Entedon. The propodeum, in having the median 

 carina double as well as in having the lateral folds strongly carinate, 

 agrees with Pleurotropis but differs markedly from Entedon. In 

 all other characters, too, it seems to coincide with Pleurotropis, and 

 in the writer's opinion that is where it should be placed. 



