APB la 1922 
PSYCHE 
VOL. XXIX. FEBRUARY 1922 
No. 1 
EGGS OF THREE CERCOPIDdE. 
By Geo. W. Barber and Vm. 0. Ellis. 
Bureau of Entomology, U. S. Department of Agriculture. 
In Eastern Massachusetts, Philcenus leucophthalmus Linn, 
and Philcenus lineatus Linn which Prof. Herbert Osborn (Bull. 
254, Me. Agri. Exp. Sta. 1916) has designated as the Meadow 
Froghopper and the Grass-feeding Froghopper respectively, 
are undoubtedly the most numerous species of Spittle insects. 
Philaronis bilineata (Say) is also found, sometimes in large num- 
bers, usually on grasses, near or on the extensive salt marshes 
of this region. 
In August 1921, the writers confined adults of these three 
species in separate lantern-globe cages in which plants of Setaria 
cglauca were growing. This grass was used because it was near at 
hand — not because these insects had showed any partiality for 
it as a food plant. 
Eggs were easily obtained in this way, and the method of 
oviposition was found to agree exactly with that observed during 
1920 when eggs of P. leucophthalmus Linn, were obtained in 
confinement and found in the field on Tansy, Tanacelum vulgare. 
Oviposition of these three species is very similar indeed. 
Individual eggs nearly agree both in shape and in color and are 
deposited in the same manner. The eggs are laid in single rows, 
side by side, in numbers of from 2 to 24. Individual eggs are 
imbedded in, and the entire mass is surrounded with a white, 
frothy appearing material which is tough and inelastic and 
securely holds the individual eggs so that they can be dissected 
from it only with difficulty. This protective material is more 
plentiful about the edges of the mass and becomes sparse at 
the top and bottom where the mass lies in close contact with the 
stem and sheath of the plant. 
