128 Bulletin Wisconsin Natural History Society. [Yol. 10, Nos. 3-4. 
LIFE HISTORY. 
Habits : Swarming Time and Notes on Flight .—Attention 
was first called to this species in Wisconsin during a cavalry trip 
from Milwaukee around Lake Winnebago, Wisconsin, and return, 
August 12th to August 21 st, 1910. The experience of these cav¬ 
alrymen (Troop A, W. N. G.) proved an object lesson in the 
obnoxiousness of midge habits at swarming time. 
July and the first part of August had been unusuallly dry, but 
on August 16th, rains changed the roads to mud. That afternoon 
we encountered for the first time large numbers of midges south 
of Neenah. Some midges were undoubtedly in the city section of 
Neenah at noon time, but were too scattered to be noticed until 
the evening, when street lights attracted the midges to definite 
points. As the line of calvary swung down the road south of the 
city towards the Neenah riflemen’s camp ground, several large 
midges were noticed flying around and, on coming to a thick clump 
of roadside bushes and trees, hundreds of these midges swarmed 
out and buzzed in the air about the men so that no one could help 
remarking their abundance. Troopers were inclined to fear them 
as giant mosquitoes with proportionately enlarged biting propensi¬ 
ties. But no one was bitten as it developed, for they were with¬ 
out the mosquito beak and were more strikingly colored, with 
yellow and black-banded abdomen and gracefully plumed anten¬ 
nae on the males. 
The material later collected was determined for me by Doctor 
O. A. Johannsen 7 of the Maine Agricultural Experiment Station, 
Orono, Maine, in a letter of September 30, 1910, stating, t( Chirono- 
mns plumosus , a widely distributed and not uncommon species,” 
the word (< Chironomns” meaning one who moves hands in ges¬ 
ticulation, for the adults (Johannsen 1905, 81) “have a peculiar 
habit of holding their forelegs high above the surface upon which 
they stand, while the mosquitoes usually hold up their hind legs.” 
They seem to use “their front legs as feelers” (Howard 1908, 
no), keeping them “constantly vibrating” (Williston 1908, m) 
as was observed at Lake Winnebago. There are times, however, 
when they are resting that they are quite motionless. 
7) Prof. Johannsen has also obliged me in proposing in a letter, Jan. 4, 
1912 (at my request) the common name “Giant Midge.” 
