STATE AGRICULTURAL SOCIETY. 
783 
OAK. ROOT. 
than in the preceding species, forming a kind of sheath for the ovipositor, 
and is fringed with rather long shining yellowish or golden hairs which 
project backward, resembling a little tuft or brush when the body is viewed 
from one side. These dilferences seem to require that these two insects 
should be regarded as gcnerically distinct from the first, and I therefore 
propose the name Philonix (qitlog, a lover ; vap, snow) for a genus for their 
reception. This genus coincides with Biarhiza in the number of joints to 
the female antennae, which is the only sex yet discovered, but differs in hav¬ 
ing rudimentary wings and the ventral valve more prominently elevated 
and ciliated with longish hairs. It may further be observed that the jaws 
of these insects resemble those of an ant, being blunt at their tips, and 
three-toothed, the inner tooth more slender and deeply separated from the 
middle one, which latter is divided from the outer one by merely a slight 
notch. And their feelers or maxillary palpi are four-jointed, the two first 
joints cylindric, the third shortest and narrowed from its apex to its base, and 
the last joint slightly thicker than those which precede it, egg-shaped, and 
clothed with bristles, the two joints next to it also having a whirl of 
bristles at their tips. 
291. Yellow-necked gall-fly, Philonix fulvicollis, new species. (Hymenoptora. 
CyniphidaL) 
This measures 0.13 to 0.15, and is the species which I have most fre¬ 
quently met with. It is black with the thorax tawny yellow, spotted ante¬ 
riorly with black, the scutel brighter yellow, and the legs dusky or blackish 
with the knees and hips of a paler dull yellowish color, the antennae being 
black to their bases. The thorax when carefully inspected shows a broad 
black stripe on its fore part, on each side of which is a small oval black 
spot, and farther down upon each side, forward of the wing-sockets, is a 
large triangular black spot. 
These insects exhale a perceptible odor, resembling that of ants or bees. 
They are oftenest met with on the first snows that fall, in the latter part 
of November and the beginning of December, and wholly disappear, I 
think, before the close of the latter month. They arc found in our forests, 
associated with the Thick-legged snow-fly,. Chionea valga, Harris, and the 
little Snow-born and Mid-winter Boreus, Borens nivoriundns et brumalis, 
Fitch ; and it is a curious fact that these several insects inhabiting the 
surface of the snow, and pertaining to widely different orders, all corre¬ 
spond with each other in being destitute of wings. Why they are thus 
deprived it is difficult to conceive. They hereby resemble small spiders 
in their appearance, several kinds of which occur upon the snow in com¬ 
pany with them. And it may be that they thus escape from being noticed 
and devoured by the birds, a few species of which, pressed by hunger, are 
industriously foraging our forests in winter. 
292. Black -necked gall-fly, Philonix nigricolli$ y new species. 
This is smaller than the preceding, being rather less than 0.12 in length, 
and is black with the basal third of the antennae and the legs obscuro 
