Kinseij, Ay res: Varieties of a Gall Wasp 



155 



MALE. — Very similar to the males of other varieties, differing as 

 follows: Median groove not distinct but extending about one-half the 

 distance to the pronotum; areolet of medium size; radial cell more or 

 less completely closed; length 2.2-3.2 mm. 



GALL. — Of exactly the same type as that of most varieties, large, 

 and when fresh covered with a dense, mossy mass of spines, filaments, 

 and aborted leaves, this covering deciduous with age and wear but 

 leaving the gall thickly studded with the bases of broken spines and fila- 

 ments. 



RANGE. — California: Berkeley (Beutenmuller) ; Santa Rosa, Palo 

 Alto, Salinas. Probably occurs thruout central California, the "Cali- 

 fornian" zone. 



TYPES. — li\ the Beutenmuller collection, the Museum of Compara- 

 tive Zoology, the Philadelphia Academy, the U.S. National Museum, 

 Stanford University, and the British Museum. Collected at Berkeley, 

 California, by E. C. Van Dyke. 



Of 37 adults we have bred, 13, or 35 per cent, are males. 

 Beutenmuller bred adults in February and March. Galls we 

 collected at Salinas on March 8 had had the insects emerge 

 previously, tho some of the galls were still fresh and green, 

 probably indicating that the gall makers had emerged only 

 recently. Galls collected at Palo Alto on March 13 had only 

 a few adults emerge later; from Santa Rosa galls of March 

 16 a larger number of adults emerged, illustrating again the 

 fact that in regions of later seasons emergence dates are later. 

 The low number of males obtained is very probably due to 

 the fact that the females are the last to emerge, and were in 

 the majority at the dates when we collected. 



Beutenmuller's material was sent by Van Dyke from 

 Berkeley, but the rose host had been transplanted from the 

 San Jacinto Mountains in southern California. We have ma- 

 terial from the San Jacinto Mountains ; it is of another and 

 rather unrelated variety, sierranensis. The types of cali- 

 fornica well match our material collected in localities not so 

 distant from Berkeley. There is no evidence that sierranen- 

 sis, transported to Berkeley, would become calif ornica. The 

 type material then represents a variety native to central Cali- 

 fornia. The nearest relative is variety versicolor from east- 

 ern Oregon, and less directly related is variety melanderi from 

 eastern Washington. Altho our Santa Rosa material is 

 distinctly calif ornica, it averages generally blacker, with some 

 individuals largely (but never entirely) black, emphasizing 

 local constancy with continual variation between localities. 



