41 



last-mentioned authors gives any characterization that would indicate 

 the structural peculiarities of Carphoxera. The other figures (Fischer 

 V. Eosl., PI. 61 ; Dup. V, PI. 173, Fig. 5) accessible of A. herhaHata also 

 show a different insect, but as both, figures and descriptions are often 

 defective, I was anxious to be able to compare actual specimens, and 

 though I have been unable so far to obtain the adolescent states of 

 the European insect, I have obtained a pair of the imagos through 

 Dr. Staudinger. They confirm the differences, and show the European 

 moth to be twice as large, more glossy, and differently marked in de- 

 tail. 



Aside from colorational differences, therefore, Carphoxera ptelearia is 

 easily distinguished from Acidalia herbariata by the spatulate tuber- 

 cles of the larva, by the lateral projection on the fifth abdominal joint 

 of the pupa, and by much smaller size, more pulverulent, less glossy 

 scaling, and different markings in the imago. 



Coming, as the American insect evidently did, from the more arid 

 regions of Mexico and the Southwest, it did not occur to me to look 

 into the European literature of the subject of Lepidopterous herba- 

 rium pests, and the statement in reference to Oarjihoxera that ^'this is 

 the first true Geometrid, so far as I know, recorded as feeding on dry 

 and dead vegetation," should have been qualified by ^^ in America." I 

 note also that according to Guenee Ryria auroraria has a taste in 

 the larval state for dry leaves. 



Dr. J. ^. Eose informs me that Mr. S. Parrish, of San Bernardino, 

 Cal., reports a similar larva in his herbarium, while the following- 

 extract from a letter from Walter H. Evans, of Orawfordsville, Ind., 

 March 7, 1892, would indicate that the species has been introduced 

 there also from Arizona plants : 



Just after your paper in the Botanical Gazette on a new herbarium pest, I 

 found three larvse in some Arizona plants of last season's collecting, which I in- 

 tended sending you, hut failed to do so. They were mislaid, hut if I can find the 

 hox in which I placed them, shall still do so. The plants most attacked were 

 Pentstemon and Castilleia, which were riddled. 



THE AUSTRALIAN ENEMIES OF THE RED AND BLACK SCALES. 



Mr. Koebele's hopes that in Orcus chalyheus he had found and sent to 

 Oalifornia an insect which would prove as important an enemy of the 

 Red Scale as Vedalia cardinalis proved for the Fluted Scale, seem so 

 far not to have been justified. Under date of June 8, Mr. Coquillett 

 wrote us as follows : 



In regard to Orcus chalyheus I will say that yesterday I spent several hours looking 

 for them among the orange trees where I turned some of them loose from time to 

 time, and found several of the heetles. The last that I turned loose in this locality 

 was ahout two months ago (April 15). Those seen yt^sterday were enjoying the 

 luxury of doing nothing. It has now been over six months since I received the first 



