The end of an outbreak of a sawfly, Neodiprion excitans Rohwer, on Pinus taeda L. first was observed in north-central peninsular Florida during December 1962. To aid in dating oviposition, the position of egg pockets in 1962 summer-shoot pine needles was compared with growth of 1963 summer-shoot pine needles. By this method, peaks of adult emergence and oviposition were judged to have occurred during the last half of August and first half of October 1962.

Eggs hatched in the fall when laid in growing pine needles during October 1962. Larval development was protracted during unusually cold weather and cocoons were spun as late as mid-January 1963. Adult emergence from these cocoons began in late May 1963, two months later than had been previously recorded for Florida.

In contrast, eggs overwintered in the foliage when laid after needle growth had ceased in the fall of 1962. Larval eclosion was in late February and March 1963 and cocoons were spun by mid-May.

This combination of events suggested how a new species overwintering in the egg stage (Neodiprion hetricki Ross) might have evolved in temporal isolation from an ancestral species ordinarily overwintering only in the cocoon (N. excitans).

On the basis of the relative size of the spermatophore sac the subfamily Gryllinae is separated into two tribes, Gymnogryllini and Gryllini, this structure being small in the former and very large in the latter. Each tribe is further divided into two subtribes on the basis of consistent differences in the shape of the epiphallus. Six new genera are added.

The presence of styli on the epiphallus of species of Turanogryllus Tarbinski is suggested as evidence for the origin of the male genitalia from the segmental appendages. Possible homologies of the structures of the male genitalia of Grylloidea and Acridoidea are suggested.

Cliniodes Guenée = Idessa Walker is an odontiine genus related to Metrea Grote. Pylartes Walker is removed from synonymy and placed in Pyraustinae near Diaphania. Cliniodes totuanalis Schaus is transferred to Pylartes. Basonga Möschler is separated from Cliniodes but kept in Odontiinae, as is Sobanga, new genus, type-species Glyphodes rutilalis Walker = G. suavis Felder. Metrea is compared with Cliniodes, and is restricted to M. ostreonalis Grote. Leucochroma ? nebulalis Walker is removed from Metrea and made the type-species of the new pyraustine genus Ametrea. M. aripanalis is transferred tentatively to Pycnarmon in the Pyraustinae. Niphostola punctata, placed by Hampson under Metrea in the British Museum collection, should remain in Niphostola. The genus is transferred to Pyraustinae from Nymphulinae.

Pyrausta glaucescens Hampson, P. costimacula Hampson and P. egcarsialis Hampson are transferred to Cliniodes, the last as a synonym of C. rubialalis Dognin. Exarcha Lederer is transferred from Pyralinae to Odontiinae, its type-species becoming C. ineptalis (Lederer).

The following species of Cliniodes are described as new: C. nacrealis, Hispaniola; C. vinacea, Bolivia; C. malleri, Brazil; C. latipennis, Bolivia.

The information to be obtained from thorough life-history studies is an extremely useful tool, perhaps especially so when ecology is being emphasized, as it is to-day, by the life-table and other mathematical approaches to the study of population processes. This information is desired by workers in many fields of entomology – by the biological and chemical control experts, the biomathematicians, the theorists and even the taxonomists. However, much of the knowledge that these workers require, for instance the fine distinctions of behaviour and environment, has been overlooked in most life-history studies, and I strongly suspect that one of the weaknesses of studies of this nature has been the failure to analyse the mode of living of an insect (or, in the case of Lepidoptera, of the immature forms) in relation to the anatomy on one hand and environmental circumstances on the other. To look for these relationships, I believe that one requires (a) the ability and perseverance to perceive detail as minute as that required for a taxonomic study, and (b) a considerable knowledge of the taxonomic detail that is to be obtained from basic morphological studies. Therefore, in this paper, attention is drawn to pertinent structural characters of lepidopterous larvae and their probable connection with the behaviour and microhabitats of the larvae, in the hope that some guidance may be offered to future students of life-histories, at least in Lepidoptera.

In southern Alberta the range of Bombus (Alpinobombus) balteatus was limited to mountainous areas with minimum elevations of 7,400 ft. When given equal opportunity to nest in above- or underground hives, queens established in two above, and 12 underground hives. The middle of the nest-establishing period in the hives was about 24 June 1962, and 17 June 1963.

Construction of the brood cell was begun before that of the honey pot. All eggs of the first brood were deposited in n single cell; not all were deposited on the same day. Second- and third-brood egg cells were built in parallel lines on each side of the incubation groove. At least once, the second brood was also workers. Succeeding broods were probably first males and then queens, as males emerged first.

Pollen was fed collectively to worker larvae of all instars, except the last, by stuffing it beneath them. All instars of male and queen larvae, except the last, were fed collectively mixtures of honey and pollen. Last-instar larvae of all broods separated from each other by spinning flimsy, incomplete cocoons, and were fed individually mixtures of honey and pollen. Hence, B. balteatus is a pocket-maker when rearing worker larvae to the last instar and a pollen-storer when rearing last-instar worker, male, and queen larvae.

Laboratory studies showed that the emergence of Rhagoletis pomonella is affected by the relative humidity of the environment. When pupae were incubated at 77° F. and relative humidities of 20, 40, 60, 80 and 100 the percentages of emergence were 0, 0, 4, 81 and 70 respectively.

Thirty-five colonies of three species of carpenter ant were examined: 25 of Camponotus herculeanus, 9 of C. noveboracensis, and 1 of C. pennsylvanicus. Workings were examined in about 150 trees. No major differences were noticed in the biology of the first two species.

All individuals were taken from two overwintering, torpid, C. herculeanus colonies; the larger contained 6,000 workers, 550 winged forms, and 6,500 larvae. Larvae were of two sizes and it is thought that the life cycle covers two years in New Brunswick. Frequency curves of worker head widths show that there are majors and minors, the minors being more numerous, especially in small colonies.

Each colony typically occupied several trees, only one of which contained the brood; the others had less extensive workings. Entrances were underground and led to tunnels connecting the trees within each colony. Surplus wood chips were buried in the ground. Ant activity in the tunnels was continuous through the day and night; few ants were seen on the forest floor.

Woodpeckers are important enemies and had attacked one third of the brood trees.

The workings frequently assist wind breakage and damage butt logs. From the roots they extend to a height of 4-6 ft., occasionally higher. 1% of the spruce, and 2-4% of the balsam fir examined had been attacked. This may lead to loss of 10% of merchantable volume, and possibly a higher figure for eastern white cedar.

Notes and illustrations of the life history of the pterophorid moth, Oidaematophorus phaceliae McD., are given, and former errors of determination are corrected.

One of the most unusual results of intensive collecting in southern Manitoba in. 1958 was the discovery of this striking representative of a dominantly coastal genus of Ephydridae. It ivas collected at several times but in only the one locality, the Bald Head Hills, a region of active sand dunes in the largely stabilized, spruce-covered area representing the shores of the Pleistocene Lake Agassiz. The species is strikingly different from other species of the genus in its thoracic and wing pattern, hut in structural characters it is fairly typical.

Bracon nuperus Cress. was reared from larvae of Orellia ruficauda (Fab.) collected at Vineland and Belleville, Ont., and Armstrong, B.C., by Dr. Peter Harris of the Research Institute, Belleville, Ont., while investigating the biological control of Canada thistle, Cirsiurn arvense (L.) Scop. (Harris, in press). The cocoon and cast skin of the last larval instar are described and illustrated here because the cephalic structures possess some unusual characteristics that differ from descriptions of this genus by other authors (Genieys 1925; Goidanich 193 1 ; Glover 1934; Salt 1931; Short 1952), and that have not been heretofore described. The methods and terminology used are similar to those described by Finlayson (1960).

Chrysopophthorus has a very wide distribution, occurring in four continents. C. chrysopimaginis Goidanich is placed as a new synonym of C. hungaricus (Z.-Kiss), which is transferred here from Helorimorpha (new combination). The other European species, C. elegans Tobias, is distinguished. Five new species are described; C. americanus from the United States, C. tropicalis, C. caribbeanus and C. brasileanus from South and Central America, and C. orientalis from Malaya.

A new species of the genus Arachnoscelis Karny (Orthoptera: Conocephalidae), A. rehni, from Costa Rica is described and compared with A. magnifica Hebard from Panama.

The electron microscope can be used to advantage in the investigation of a physiological problem, where the reactions are differentiated at the cellular rather than at the tissue level. This set of electron micrographs shows some of the morphological arrangements accompanying various excretory functions in Tenebrio larvae.

The Tenebrio larva has a cryptonephridial arrangement of the Mlalpighian tubes, in that the distal end of each tube is applied to the surface of the rectum and covered by a heavy membrane, in which periodic “Windows”, the leptophragmata, occur where the membrane is very thin or replaced by a different structure. The free part of the tubes can be differentiated into physiological zones by means of their succinic dehydrogenase activity, which is high in places and low in others along the tube showing no gross morphological differences. The hindgut also contributes to the excretory work of the iinsect. Thc cryptonephridial part of the tube is unique in ultra-structure among cells so far studied. The membrane structure is very extensive, and mitochondria very numerous. Membrane structures bearing no resemblance to ordinary reticulum are common, especially near the leptophragma. The leptophragma is a complex structure, made up of parts from both the Malpighian tube cell and surrounding membrane. Its appearance strongly suggests that it forms a region of easy transport for water and solutes between lumen of tube and body cavity.

Ten Taeniothrips species known or expected to occur in Canada are keyed, described and illustrated, and information on their host plants and distribution is given. Methods of collection and preparation, and characteristics used in the identification of Taeniothrips species are described. A few new terms for structures are adopted.

Numbers of the elaterid beetle, Hemicrepidius morio (LeConte) were attracted to cages containing logs or bark. Males greatly predominated. Evidence is presented for assuming a sex attractant, from females in the cages or in the traps used, to be involved.

This author and others have previously proposed that causes of population fluctuations can be ascertained by regression analysis in which Nt+1/Nt is the dependent variable, and Nt is one of the independent variables. This procedure contains a bias, since the expected relationship between Nt+1/Nt and Nt is hyperbolic when there is no causal relationship. The simplest way of circumventing this difficulty is to use Nt+1, not Nt+1/Nt as the dependent variable.

The seasonal and geographical distribution of Tabanidae in Manitoba was investigated. Females were trapped in 27 localities in Manitoba by means of a horse-fly trap developed at the University of Manitoba.

The species composition varies in different areas. Wet, swampy, forested areas yield a much greater variety of species than drier farming areas.

The first tabanids appear during the last week of May and by the end of July very few are active. The seasonal distribution of species in some of the trapping sites was plotted. Hybomitra metabola (McD.) and H. nuda (McD.) are the earliest species that occur in large numbers in areas where they are found. In the latter half of June the summer species such as H. lasiophthalma (Macq.), H. frontalis (Wlk.), H. epistates (O.S.), H. typhus (Whitn.), Tabanus similis Macq. and the Chrysops species appear in large numbers.

P. 1432, line 10; “Holotypes” should read “Homotypes”.

De 1956 à 1962, 151 lignées parthénogénétiques du puceron du pois, Acyrthosiphon pisum (Harr.), furent collectionnées dans les régions cultivées du Québec et de la partie de l'ontario située à l'est du lac Huron. On remarqua qu'en élevage sur pois Perfection, les lignées les plus fortes étaient celles provenant de la luzerne et les plus faibles, celles provenant du trèfle. D'autres lignées de comportement intermédiaire étaient originaires de l'une ou l'autre plante-hôte primaire. On a réussi à démontrer l'existence de races, c'est-à-dire de groupes de biotypes particulièrement abondants sur une plante-hôte, à la suite d'élevages standardisés aux conditions suivantes: quatre groupes de trois femelles vivipares aptères de chaque lignéte étaient élevés séparément, chacun sur six plants de pois Perfection, pour une période de neuf jours à la température constante de 68 degrés Fahrenheit.

A rearing chamber designed to test colour preference by biotypes of pea aphid, Acyrthosiphon pisum (Harr.), indicated preferences for orange or yellow or both (615 mμ, and 595 mμ). Aphids of biotype R1 confined to chemical diets back-lighted blue or white survived only for a few days, whereas they lived longer and grew rapidly on diets lighted orange or yellow.