IOWA ACADEMY OP SCIENCES. 
197 
The counties reporting Cicadas for 1888 are as follows: Ben- 
ton, Black Hawk, Bachanan, Clayton, Clinton, Cedar, Delaware, 
Dubuque, Iowa, Jackson, Johnson, Jones, Louisa, Muscatine, 
Scott, Tama. This shows only the counties reporting but does 
not indicate the extent or distribution in the counties, and this, 
for the border counties particularly, is quite important in fix- 
ing a definite boundary. I took pains therefore to locate the 
particular township from which the reports came, which was 
possible by examining the records at the secretary’s office in 
Des Moines, and was thus able to locate the actual boundary 
usually within six miles at most, certainly within the limits of 
the ordinary flight of the insect. 
The line of townships beginning at the Mississippi river in 
Muscatine county and naming those on the border line from 
which positive reports were received is as follov/s: Muscatine 
county, Fruitland, Cedar; Louisa county, Columbus City; Iowa 
county, York, Summer; Benton county. Saint Clair; Tama 
county, Clark, Geneseo; Black Hawk county, Spiny Creek; 
Buchanan county, Sumner; Clayton county, Cox Creek, Clayton. 
For convenience sake we may carry our line through the 
towns and villages nearest this line and it will be approxi- 
mately as follows: Fruitland, along south line of Muscatine 
to Columbus City, then along the west of the Iowa river till in 
Johnson county, then northwest to York Center, Iowa county 
and to near Ladora, then northeast to Blairs town, then north- 
west to Dysart, then northeast through Laporte City, Independ- 
ence, Strawberry Point, Elkader and Clayton. 
The area of natural timber corresponding for the most part 
with the valleys of the rivers and smaller streams, the distribu- 
tion of Cicada may be pretty accurately expressed by defining 
them, and on this basis they may be said to occur in the valley 
of the Iowa river from Columbus City to west of Marengo, in 
the valley of the Cedar river and its tributaries as far to the 
northwest as Laporte City. In the Yv^apsipinicon to Independ- 
ence, in the Maquoketa to Strawberry Point, in the Turkey 
to Elkader, and north on the Mississippi from south central 
Muscatine county nearly to McGregor. 
Numerous reports not specially indicated, attest their abun- 
dance in all the central counties of this area and need not be 
specified but some which bear particularly upon the border 
line may be quoted here. 
