276 
Psyche 
[September-December 
OBSERVATIONS ON L. CHILOPSIDIS 
According to Bohart and Bohart (1966) this species is distributed 
from Chihuahua, Mexico, north to southern Colorado and east into 
Texas. Our observations were made during late June and early 
July 1975 in sand dunes bordering the Rio Grande valley, at the 
La Joya Waterfowl Preserve, 20 miles north of Sorocco, New 
Mexico. At this locality, females were commonly observed in the 
dunes during the morning and again during late afternoon; during 
the heat of midday they were rarely seen. Their activity consisted 
mainly of walking in sinuous patterns over the sand and investigating 
small depressions and burrow entrances in the sand surface. In 
contrast to some Larrinae, females did not flicker their wings while 
hunting. Often they dug with the front legs and occasionally they 
entered holes in the sand. Most females were followed by one or 
more satellite flies hovering 6-8 cm behind (Table 1). We captured 
several of these flies and found that two species were involved: 
Senotainia rufiventris (Coquillett) and S. (?) flavicornis (Town- 
send) (Sarcophagidae, Miltogramminae) (det. R. J. Gagne) (Table 
1). L. chilopsidis females appeared to spend a great deal of time 
searching, as evidenced by the many hours we spent following them 
before one was observed to locate her prey. All L. chilopsidis ob- 
served preyed on Ammohaenetes phrixocnemoides (Caudell) (Gryl- 
lacrididae, Rhaphidophorinae) , a sand treader camel cricket (4 
records). 
Table 1. Records of satellite flies observed following female 
Larropsis species. 
Number of 
Number of females 
flies per $ 
L. chilopsidis 
L. vegeia 
O 
11 
7 
T 
15 
1 
2 
1 
0 
3 
0 
0 
4 
1 
0 
Observation A . — The first interaction between female and prey 
was observed at 0920 on 27 June. The wasp was seen moving over 
the sand surface and digging briefly in various places. She flushed 
a sand treader camel cricket from just beneath the surface. The 
cricket jumped approximately 1.5 m but the wasp did not follow. 
We recovered the cricket and threw it at the wasp, which seized it 
