504 
ANNUAL REPORT OP NEW TORE 
STRITED FLEA-BEETLE. SCIENTIFIC NAME. LEAPING POWER. WINTER QUARTERS. 
sides of glass and otlior smooth surfaoos. The fourth joint is inserted botween the lobes of 
the third joint, and is slonder, gradually more thick to its ond, whoro it is furnishod with 
two minute claws. 
These beetles vary iu having the slender middle portion of the 
pale-yellow stripe upon the wing-covers entirely obliterated, leav¬ 
ing only the two ends of the stripe, and thus forming four spots 
upon the back of the closed wing-covers. This four-spotted vari¬ 
ety was described previous to the normally marked insect, by 
Fabricius, in the year 1801, who gave it the name Crioceris bipus- 
tulata (Systema Eleutheratorum, vol. i, p. 4(54). But as this is 
only the name of a variety, it is not entitled to stand as the designa¬ 
tion of the species. On a subsequent page (469) of the same vol¬ 
ume, Fabricius described the species more correctly, naming it 
Crioceris vittata, but he had already given this name to another 
species of this genus, hence it could not be employed to designate 
this species also. In 1806 it received the name striolata from 
Iiliger (Magazine, vol. vi, p. 148), and by this name it has since 
been currently designated. 
A small black beetle, with two pale yellowish spots on each of 
its wing-covers, which is very common iu our gardens, so much 
resembles the four-spotted variety of this flea beetle, that corre¬ 
spondents have sometimes sent it to me, supposing it to be the 
same insect. It is the Four-spotted Bembidium (IJ. A-maxulalum , 
Linn. Fauna Suecica, vol. i, p. 813), a species common to Europe 
and this country. By noticing its motions, it will readily be dis¬ 
tinguished from the flea-beetle. It never hops, but, sparkling like 
a diamond in the bright sunshine, it runs briskly in a very serpen¬ 
tine or zigzag track, a few inches, till it gains some crack in the 
ground, or other covert, in which it abruptly disappears. It feeds 
on other insects—its strength and agility enabling it to overpower 
those that are much larger than it in size. 
This Striped flea-beetle and all the group of insects to which 
it pertains, and which form the genus Haltica , are readily known 
by the great thickness of their hind thighs, which gives them the 
power of leaping to a prodigious distance, considering their small 
size. They are able to leap about eighteen inches, which is about 
216 times the length of their bodies. They seldom walk, and 
when at rest they sit with their hind legs folded under them, ready 
to skip away in an instant, if any danger approaches them. But 
it is during the warmth of the day and in the clear sunshine that 
they are thus active; After sundown they become more sluggish, 
