1970] 
Eberhard — Fungus Gnats 
365 
for about three hours. Then after a few twitches by the female, 
they separated, and both hung for several moments under the pupal 
skin. 
The other observed mating involved two individuals placed in 
a cage after being captured in copulo under a pupal skin and then 
kept separated for several hours. In the course of several minutes 
of flying around the cage, the male brushed against the female several 
times as she sat on the floor, and each time she started and moved 
away. One time, however, she did not move away when the male 
landed on her back. He immediately curled the tip of his abdomen 
over hers, engaged it against the ventral surface of the tip of hers, 
and then dismounted and turned 180° to face away from her. They 
both rested on the floor for over an hour, then separated. On 
another occasion a male attempted to mate with another female (a 
virgin) in the same situation, but was unsuccessful. Although she 
allowed him to land on her back, she did not let him press the tip 
of his abdomen against the ventral surface of hers: whenever he 
curled the tip of his abdomen over hers, she moved her abdomen to 
the side or pressed it against the surface she was on. 
It is not clear how often copulation occurs between two free-flying 
individuals in nature. It may be difficult for males to locate, recog- 
nize, and couple with free-flying females, but the smoothness with 
which the one male mounted, locked, and then turned and dis- 
mounted suggests that this type of mating may occur naturally. 
Eggs 
Oviposition by both virgin females in captivity and presumably 
mated females in nature appeared to be nearly identical. Eggs were 
laid singly rather than in clusters. The female walked quickly over 
the surface on which the egg would be laid, pausing occasionally 
and rubbing the tip of her abdomen rapidly back and forth on the 
surface. Egg laying did not always accompany these pre-oviposition 
movements. The female bent her abdomen forward underneath her 
body so that the tip was nearly under her thorax as she laid an egg. 
Usually she deposited some clear fluid just before laying the egg, and 
this dried and remained visible around the margins of eggs laid on 
glass in the laboratory. In captivity, some eggs lacked this fluid, 
and some deposits of the fluid lacked eggs. The maximum number 
of eggs laid by a female in captivity was no. Each egg was oval, 
about 0.8 mm long, and covered with tiny points apparently similar 
to those on the eggs of L. walkeri (Brocher 1931). Eggs found in 
