210 
Melolonthid^.- 
-INSECTS. Bipiiyelocera. 
t’ig. sa 
Family— ANOPLOGNATHID^. 
These are Australian and Brazilian insects, in which 
the clypeus conceals the mouth, and the maxillae have 
an obtuse lobe. The antennae are similar, or nearly so, 
in both sexes. Anoplognathus is the typical genus; 
some of them have a curious j'ellow and green tinsel- 
like lustre. Calloodes Grayianus is a very fine insect 
described by the writer, and 
named out of gratitude to Dr. 
John Edward Gray, the able 
keeper of the zoological depart- 
ment in the British Museum. 
It is figured on Plate 1, fig. 4, 
Eindidysus Lamprimoides is 
from King George’s Sound. 
Geniates and Leucothyreus are 
two genera with many Brazilian 
species. Fig. 88 represents the 
Epididysus Lamprimoides, Or Epididysus 
Lamprimoides, a fine insect of a yellowish metallic 
green, with the thorax and body beneath downy. 
Family — MELOLONTHID.®. 
In this truly leaf-eating family the antennm in the 
different sexes vary much ; the plates of these organs 
in the males being at times very large, as in Polyphylla 
Fullo, a common European, but very rare and only 
occuasional British species. The species, as in Encya 
and Pholidotus, are often covered with scales, while 
others of a South African genus are very hairy. In this 
family the maxillie are toothed. 
Our common Cockchafer [Melolontlia vidyaris) is 
a well-known example. It is thoroughly crepuscular, 
resting on trees during the da}'. At times they abound 
and are very destructive to foliage." The larvse feed 
on the roots of grass, and continue in the grub state 
several years. At times these chafers become quite a 
plague. The cuts, copied from Ratzeburg, show the 
male of this beetle, with its curved larva and the pupa 
— fig. 89. Below the larva is a figure of the antenna 
Fig. 89. 
a Meloloiitha vulgaris, b harva. c Pupa, d Antenna of male, 
e Profile of the abdomen. 
of a male, with the plates extended. Below the pupa 
you see a profile view of the pointed abdomen. There 
are four families — Putelidce, Melolonthidce, Scricidce, 
and Hoplida’. The cuts are of the genera Serica and 
Anisoplia — figs. 90 and 91. 
The Hoplia group is very extensive. Many of them 
are African. Ceraspis is a pretty Brazilian genus, with 
a heart-shaped scutellum. 
Fig. 90. 
Fig. 91. 
Anisoplia agricola. 
DiplmcepTiala is Australian and a metallic-coloured 
genus ; Pyronota. a brilliant New Zealand genus, also 
highly metallic on the surface. 
The cuts show the forms of the curious genus 
Biphyllocera, as I named it in Captain Grey’s Nar- 
rative. Fig. 92, a, represents the male, and h the 
female, of Biphyllocera Kirhyana, named by the writer 
after the venerable author of the “ Introduction." 
Fig. 92. 
Biphyllocera Kirhyana— a, male; 6, female. 
Biphyllocera is the only genus of laracllicorn beetles 
that I know, which has compound lamellated anten- 
antennae. It is indigenous to King George’s Sound, 
Western Australia. 
The Melolonthidce and other destructive insects are 
much kept in check by birds, which, especially when 
young, are chiefly fed on insect food. A cautious ob- 
server found a nest of young jays; he noticed that each 
of the five jays, while yet very young, consumed at 
least fifteen of these full-sized grubs in one day, and of 
course would require many more of a smaller size. Say 
that on an average of sizes they consumed twenty a 
piece, these for the five make one hundred. Each of the 
parents consume, say fifty; so that the pair and family 
devour two hundred every day. This in three months 
amounts to twenty thousand in one season. But as the 
grub continues in that state four seasons, this single 
pair, with their family alone, without reckoning their 
descendants after the first year, would destroy eighty 
thousand grubs.* An American species of Beetle, of 
the same family, and called there the May-beetle 
• Anderson’s Recreations. 
