10 



INSECTS OF SAMOA. 



HIPPOBOSCIDAE 

 By G. F. Ferris, Stanford University, California 

 (With 6 Text-figures) 



Mr. p. a. Buxton has submitted to me the Hippoboscidae collected by him 

 and by Mr. Hopkins in Samoa and the New Hebrides. Except for certain speci- 

 mens which have a direct bearing upon the Samoan material, the series from 

 the New Hebrides is not here reported upon. The Samoan material includes 

 representatives of five species, of which one is described below as new. 



Ornithoica Rondani. 



I have in earlier papers* called attention to the conditions within this 

 genus. Nine or ten named species have been referred to it, only two or three 

 of which can be identified at all on the basis of the existing descriptions. Never- 

 theless, dipterists have presumed to treat at least six of these species as 

 synonymous with the entirely unrecognisable American species, 0. confluenta 

 (Say). It may very well be that some of these names are indeed synonyms, but 

 that remains to be determined after an examination of properly prepared material. 

 Among the numerous specimens now available to me for study from various 

 sources, there are represented at least four quite distinct species. However, 

 the characters separating these species are such that they will almost certainly 

 be obscured or entirely invisible in the conventional pinned and shrivelled 

 material with which dipterists have been content to work. For the accompany- 

 ing descriptions and figures, I have employed material which has been mounted 

 upon slides in a manner that has been described elsewhere. 



Because of these conditions, it follows that any reference of specimens to 

 named species in this genus is largely a matter of guesswork. Of the two 



* A Note on Some Hippoboscidae (Diptera Pupipara), Entomological News, Vol. 35, p. 234 

 (1924). 



Fourth Report upon Diptera Pupipara from the Philippine Islands, Philippine Journal 

 of Science, Vol. 28, p. 329 (1925). 



Report upon a Collection of Hippoboscidae (Diptera Pupipara) from Borneo, Sarawak 

 Museum Journal (in press 1927). 



