During the last seven years the writer has taken advantage of every opportunity to study the stoneflies, or Plecoptera, of Illinois. The desire to have this investigation rest upon an understanding of the bionomic and taxonomic relationships of this order in North America as a whole has led to the collection by myself of material in other geographical regions and the examination of specimens collected hy others in various localities.

Sphex (Ammophila) nigricans. Dahl. Several nests were seen on October 12, 1930, at Pittsburgh Lake, Ill. (Opposite St. Louis, Mo.). The mothers were excavating nests although it was very late in the season. The burrows in the ground were “L” shaped; the neck, one-half inch in diameter by one-half inch long; the pocket at the bottom, one-inch wide by three-fourths inches deep. I found one caterpillar at the bottom of each of the three nests I opened.

The Purcell Range forms the easternmost portion of the Selkirk Mountains. It runs nearly north and south and is well marked off from other mountain ranges by the Rocky Mountain Trench on the east and the Purcell Trench on the west. The latter is occupied in part by Kootenay Lake. Even the broad geography of this range is imperfectly known as yet and its entomological resources are practically unknown.

The matter offered for consideration in this paper deals entirely with one phase of the rearing of Chelonus annulipes Wesm., a larval parasite ovipositing in the egg of the European Corn Borer, Pyrausta nubilalis Hubn. This phase, the effect on the percentage of successful parasitism, of the age of the host eggs at the time of attack, is one of the more important factors determining the success or failure of laboratory rearing and distribution of this species.

Female. Length 8 mm.; exserted portion of ovipositor 5 mm. Temples lather flat, strongly sloping inwards, broadest above, narrowing strongly below, especially narrow where occipital carina bends outwards above genae to approach eye, at this point temples distinctly narrower than malar space. Eyes prominently convex; head transverse, width including eyes distinctly greater than height.

It was indeed sad news which reached Ottawa on April 17, 1934, announcing the death earlier in the day of Eric Hearle, a most valuable officer of the Dominion Entomological Service. Mr. Hearle's health had been indifferent for some five years but he did not realize his condition until early January of 1933 when he attended meetings of dairymen and veterinarians at the coast and the effort in this regard affected his health to such an extent that on the advice of a Vancouver heart specialist he went to bed for several months, after which he was granted extended leave from continuous official duties.

Early in 1933, Dr. E. G. Hood of the Dairy and Cold Storage Branch, Dominion Department of Agriculture, submitted to the Dominion Entomologist some specimens of dermestid insect larvae taken in a dried milk establishment at Princeton, Ont. These insects which were passed to me, resembled larvae of the buffalo carpet beetle. Adult beetles that emerged late in March and in April, however, showed the species to be Trogoderma versicolor Creutzer (det. W. J. Brown).

The following list of beetles is the result of collecting done in Glacier National Park, Montana, during three summer vacations, 1924, 1929, and 1931.

It is readily recalled that this park covers an area of fifty miles from north to south and about thirty-five miles from east to west, running along the international boundary.

The phenomena of aestivation and overwintering of ants present a most interesting study. The similarities between the two as well as their many differences offer excellent comparisons. Little work has actually been accomplished with ants in this field in spite of the studies of arthropod hibernation instigated by Holmquist (I) and others. The purpose of this paper is to present some of the more important physical and biotic factors involved in the aestivation and overwintering periods of the Occident ant. Pogonomyrmex occidentalis Cresson, in a portion of the Northern Desert Shrub region, near Twin Falls, Idaho.

In a recent paper by Dr. J. G. Meyers (1929) entitled “Faculative Blood-Sucking in Phytophagous Hemiptera” an excellent summary of our knowledge of this interesting phenomenon is given. The above cited paper, and others listed in the bibliography at the conclusion of the present paper, recalled to mind certain experiences and observations made in collecting these insects during the past few years.

The Odonatan Fauna of the Big Bend Region of Trans-Pecos, Texas, although not an extensive one, is yet very interesting and practically unknown. For these reasons it seems worth while to record the observations and the specimens collected during the period from September, 1928, to July, 1930, and September, 1931, while the writer was stationed at the Pink Bollworm Laboratory at Presidio, Texas.

Nearly all insects are in some degree beset with hair-like structures of varying length and stiffness and density and frequently of varing color. So much is familiar to every entomologist, even to those who have never examined an insect with a magnification higher than that of a hand lens.

The following notes are based on observations of young larvae from the time of hatching until they became established within the apples or were lost or dried.

The white female of mendii Edw. without the typical burnt-orange color. Green of under sides, common character of black border maculation and rose tinted fringes and antennae as usual. The cell spot on the upper side of the secondaries is cream color and beneath it has the usual silver center.

The mountain pine beetle (Dendroctonus monticolae Hopk.) has killed millions of trees during the past ten years in Montana, Idaho, and eastern Washington. It was during a serious epidemic of this beetle that the writer undertook a study of the economic importance and biology of its enemies in an effort to determine what insects were the most beneficial and to work out their seasonal history so that artificial control work could be instituted, if possible, at a time that would destroy fewer beneficial insects.

In May, 1933, my attention was drawn to a peculiar leaf injury to young cotton plants at Presidio, Texas. The leaves showed a striking reddish brown spotting from the upper side that at first glance resembled red-spider injury. The damaged plants were quite localized in one section of a large cotton field. Examinaion revealed the presence of large numbers of lace bugs present on the lower surface of the leaves. This species was identified as Gargaphia iridescens Champion by H. G Barber of the U. S. National Museum. Gibson, 1919, records the food plants as Ambrosia, Solanum, Malva, and sand nettle. According to records in the U. S. National Museum, this species has been collected by McMillan at Brownsville, Texas, on Solanum, string beans, and Ambrosia; on egg plant at Olmito, Texas, by McMillan; on Croton texanus at Tucson, Arizona, by W. D. Pierce.

Very little work has been done on the life history or habits of Mallophaga. Only two papers have heen published since 1913 which give even a general discussion of the life history of these parasites. The number of instars through which the insects pass was not determined in either case. For the experiments reported in this paper, the pigeon louse (Columbicola columbae [Linnaeus]) was chosen because of the ease of obtaining and handling the common host, Columba livia Linn.

While attending the University of Alberta, at Edmonton, the writer caught a male dragonfly on May 17, 1925, near a small pool in the Valley of the North Saskatchewan River which he provisionally determined as Tetragoneuria spinigera (Say).

In January of 1924 (Can. Ent., vol. LVI, No. I, p. 2.), I created the genus Hoppingiana to receive a species of Melyrid that did not fit into any of the previous generic definitions. Of late considerable discussion has arisen over the possibility that Hoppingiana brevilabris Blais. is the true Dasytes hudsonicus of LeConte. My male specimen of hudsonicus Lec. was received from Wickham and was collected in the alpine regions of Colorado.

This paper is a result of the study of the Aphodius in the A. cadaverinus (Mann.) group in the collection of the writer. In determining a goodly number of specimens of this interesting group, one new species has conic to light.