1978] 
Moore <& Orth — Bryothinusa 
185 
White Point City Park, San Pedro, Los Angeles, California (Fig. 
9, photograph), occupies approximately a mile of a narrow strip of 
cliff and rocky beach along the Pacific Ocean just a few miles north 
of Point Firmin. Access to the beach is by a steep road down the 
cliff which joins a road along the beach. The beach area consists of 
four rocky embayrnents between five short points. The second 
embayment from the south is somewhat protected from the open 
ocean by a 6 foot to 10 foot high ledge along the seaward side of 
which is the ruin of a concrete wall. Between the concrete wall and 
the road at the base of the cliff is a shallow reef which is exposed at 
low-water and under water at high tide. The area is largely a field of 
boulders two or three feet across with smaller stones and gravel in 
sand. The staphylinids and their larvae were found beneath and on 
the stones in an association with dense worm tubes, chitons, limpets, 
small abalones, flat worms, small crabs and brittle stars. They were 
most readily collected by a flotation method in which stones were 
agitated in a bucket of seawater. The insects floated to the surface 
where they were lifted with a camel’s hair brush and transferred to a 
vial of alcohol. Collecting in the intertidal zone is best done in the 
fall and winter when low tides occur during daylight. 
The larva of Bryothinusa catalinae Casey 
* (Fig. 2) 
Color. Semitransparent-white except the apices of the mouth- 
parts and the larger setae which are nebulously brown, and black 
eye-spots on the head. 
Head round, widest just behind the eye-spots, neck absent. Ocelli 
apparently absent. With an ovoid heavily pigmented eye spot on 
each side near the base of the antenna. Clypeal margin (Fig. 6) with 
four small teeth. Antenna three-segmented (Fig. 5); first segment 
wider than long; second segment about as wide as first, almost twice 
as long as wide, apex with two articulated processes, each about 
one-third as wide as apex of second segment; one process an “acorn- 
like seta”, bears no seta on its surface, is almost twice as long as the 
other and is somewhat sinuate; the other process which is the actual 
third antennal segment, bears several ordinary setae and is about 
twice as long as wide. Maxilla (Fig. 7) with the stipes longer than the 
palpus, outer half of inner margin with closely placed short teeth. 
Maxillary palpus three-segmented; first segment about as long as 
