APR 3 0 1907 
The Ohio H\£aturalist, 
PUBLISHED BY 
The Biological Club of the Ohio Stale University. 
Volume VII. APRIL, 1907. No. 6 
TABLE OF CONTENTS. 
IIine— Robber Flies of tlie Genus Philonicus. 115 
Stowe— Winter Key to Ohio Chestnuts. 118 
Jackson, Mrs.—N otes and Methods on Collecting and Preserving Thysanura. 119 
IIawkins— The Development of the Sporangium of Equisetum hyemale. 122 
ROBBER FLIES OF THE GENUS PHILONICUS. 
James S. Hine. 
Philonicus was proposed by Loew in Linnaea Entomologica, 
Volume IV, page 144, to receive a single European species which 
had been known under the name of Asilus albiceps. After 
studying the last named European species carefully, I find that 
we have at least four distinct North American species which are 
congeneric with it. Bellardi referred two Mexican species to 
the genus, but Williston concludes that one of these belongs to 
Heligmoneura and has published the synonymy in Biologia 
Centrali Americana. So the four species are made up of three 
from the United States and one from Mexico. 
It appears that American authors have been misled by the 
fact that Loew proposed Philodicus as a generic name in another 
section of the same subfamily, thus giving two names so near 
alike as to be easily confused. His description of the latter 
genus is published in Linnaea Entomologica, Volume III, page 
391. The singular thing about the matter is, that Loew himself 
in Dipteren Fauna Sudafrika’s, page 144, uses Philodicus 
where he intended Philonicus, and I suspect this fact also has 
proven a stumbling block to some students. 
So far as known at present there are no species of Philodicus 
in North America, so the name is most likely misplaced when 
used in reference to Nearctic Diptera. 
In his studies of European Asilinae Loew used many char¬ 
acters taken from the oviduct; thus he separated the females 
into two groups, one in which the oviduct is conical and one in 
which the oviduct is compressed. European species appear to 
be separated readily by this character, but in our species, 
especially after they are dry, some difficulties are encountered, 
ulBRAl 
NEW YC 
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