49 
one was seen hanging from the under side of the wire, to which it was 
clinging- by the aid of its strong claws, while between its body and the 
wire, and firmly held in its embrace, was an adult locust, into whose 
body the proboscis of the fly was inserted. The fly was not particular 
as to the kind of locust it captured, sometimes catching and feeding 
upon the Devastating Locust, at other times attacking an undeter- 
mined species of spineless-breasted locust. When not feeding, these 
flies were very shy, taking wing whenever approached at all closely, 
but when engaged in feeding I had no difficulty in capturing them in 
my hand. On the same day above mentioned I saw several of these flies 
paired, but I know nothing in regard to their early stages. Professor 
Eiley has recorded the fact that the larvse of an allied species, the Eraat 
hastardi Macq., feed upon the eggs of locusts, and it is very probable 
that the larvae of the present species has the same commendable habit. 
Of internal parasites I know of only one species that attacks locusts ; 
this is a grayish black, two-winged fly which closely resembles the 
common House Fly but belongs to a different family, the Sarcophagidae, 
and to the typical genus Sarcophaga; the thorax is marked with three 
blackish, longitudinal lines, and the abdomen is marmorate with darker 
spots which are changeable in different lights. I first met with speci- 
mens of this fly on the 15th of August in Tehama County; the locality 
was a small tract of land covered with low-growing weeds, among which 
were quite a large number of locusts of different kinds. The flies were 
resting upon dead weeds, stones, etc., and whenever a locust of any 
kind took to its wings one of these flies would dart after, and appear to 
strike it, but this was evidently the method in which the fly attaches 
her eggs to the bodies of the locusts. When thus struck by one of the 
flies the locust in nearly every instance would at once close up its wings 
and fall to the ground, as if aware of danger. I did not succeed in 
breeding the perfect flies from these locusts, but among a large number 
of insects sent me for names by Mr. E. M. Ehrhorn, of Mountain View, 
was a single specimen of the same kind of fly which he informed me was 
received with several others from a Placer County correspondent; the 
locust which he pointed out to me as being the one from which this fly 
was bred belongs to the destructive California species. Melanoplus devas- 
tator Scudd. While at Marysville, Mr. G. W. Harney, the President of 
the Yuba County Board of Horticulture, showed me a Dipterous pupa 
which he had bred from one of our largest spineless-breasted locusts, 
Dissostcira spurcata Stal. ; but as the fly never issued from this pupa 
the species to which the latter belongs can not be ascertained, although 
it is very probable that it belongs to the same species referred to above. 
In Merced County, in the summer of 1885, 1 collected quite a large 
number of specimens of this same kind of locust, inclosing them in a 
bottle containing potassium cyanide, and from one of these issued a 
Dipterous larva, which, however, was not observed until it had been 
killed by the fumes of the cyanide, so that the species to which it 
belonged could not be ascertained. 
19539— No. 27 i 
