NATURAL ENEMIES OF THE LOCUST. 263 
Mr. Dodge sent us, with the same lot of larvae, what he supposed to be 
the parent fly, reared from a lot of locust eggs among which the larvae 
were found. His flies, however, proved to be the Anthoinyia egg-para- 
site (A . augustifrons, Meigen, First Eeport, p. 285). The single pupa 
thus obtained from Mr. Dodge's specimen agrees with those of Systcechus 
oreas m O. S., presently to be described. 
During the past two years we have been in correspondence with Prof. 
J. G. Lemmon, of Sierra Valley, Gal., who has kindly sent us many 
specimens of the locusts occurring there, and especially the eggs and 
early stages of Camnula pellucida. 
Among such eggs these bee-fly larvae were, if anything, more common 
than we had found them among the eggs of Caloptenus spretus east of 
the mountains. We here quote one letter in illustration : 
By this mail I dispatch another cigar-box rilled, this time, with sods containing 
eggs of the terrible locust that for three years past has devastated Sierra Valley ; also 
the large, fat, white larva that latoly made its appearance as a voracious feeder upon 
locust eggs. Wo don't know certainly what this larva becomes, but at a venture he 
is hailed with great joy. 
The ground that was first filled with locust eggs by the (Edipoda atrox, by the end 
of September looked as if scattered with loose shells, so thorough was the work of de- 
struction. 
A few of them were detected in among the eggs in April, but not generally. until 
Angust. One individual seems to empty several egg cases before retiring from the 
feast and coiling himself up in a case which he has emptied, or in a nidus of his own 
make. — [J. G. Lemmon, in letter to C. V. Riley, October 12, 1879. 
During 1878 and 1879 we failed to rear any of them to the perfect 
state, bat on June 20 of the present year, 1880, we obtained from these 
California larvae the first fly. This proved to be a male of Triodites mus 
O. S., 333 as kindly identified for us by Mr. S. W. Williston, of New Haven. 
The delay in the printing of this report enables us to complete the natu- 
ral history of these insects. We have, during the summer, reared many 
additional specimens of this species and also of the Systcechus oreas O. S. 
. already alluded to. Professor Lemmon and his brother, Mr. W. C. Lem- 
mon, have also succeeded in obtaining the mature flies, and have ob- 
served this Systcechus abundantly buzzing about over the ground in 
which the locust eggs were laid, as the following extracts from the cor- 
respondence of these gentlemen will show : 
An enemy which has proved very destructive in Sierra Valley and vicinity is the 
larva of, as yet, an unknown insect. It is first observed as a large yellowish-white 
grub about half an inch or even three-fourths of an inch long when extended, it being 
usually curved so that the head and tail nearly touch. It is one-sixth to one-fifth of 
an inch thick just back of the head and tapers slightly towards the tail, also flattened 
slightly dorsally. It is usually found in a case of locust eggs which it has devoured, 
pushing the empty shells aside, and at last occupying the space where were 21 to 36 
eggs. Often it is found iu a little space below a number of emptied cases, as though 
it had feasted off the contents of several nests. 
332 Western Diptera, p. 254; Bull. Hayden's Geol. and Geogr. Survey, III, No. 2. 
m Ibid., p. 246. 
