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PSYCHE.

AN UNUSUAL APPEARANCE OF SCHISTOCERCA AMERICANA.

BY W. S. BLATCHLEY, TERRE HAUT2, IND.

About three o’clock in the morningof April ith, 1893 the city of TerreHaute, Indiana, was visited with a

severe storm of rain and wind from thesouthwest.A number of buildings were unroofed

and many shade and forest trees twistedand broken off.While on my way to the High

School building several persons in-formed me that they had that morningseen specinens of "gigantic grass-hoppers" on the streets but were unableto capture them. About ten o’clockone of my former pupils brought metwo living, mature specimens of thatlarge and handsome locust, Scisto-cerca americana Drury, which she hadpicked up from the sidewalk near herhome. I was much surprised to seethem as the earliest date at which Ihad before noted the species in thisvicinity was June 27, I89, when Ifound them common and freshlymoulted in a small prairie east of TerreHaute. I have never seen the young or

imagos in winter but have taken thelatter in numbers as late as November22nd.

On looking up all references as totheir time of appearance in other locali-ties I find nothing definite as to whetherthe species hibernates as imago or

young and but little about its appear-ance in spring. Dr. Riley gives JuneI4th as the date of its appearance at St.Louis,* and states]" that the averageperiod between hatching and maturityis 7 days. He also states++ that "Cer-tain large locusts, belonging to thegenera Acridium and Oed@oda, hiber-nate in the full grown, winged stateand that two species which aremost often found with the young (ofMelanoplus spretus Uhler) are theAmerican Acridiutn, (Acridiumanericnum Drury) and the Coral-winged Locust( Oed@oda poeic@-tera Germ)." He does not say in so

many words that americana hiber-nates in the mature state, though fromthe context one would infer that he someant. In this locality the Coral-winged Locust, now known as ]-Zi152is-

First Report U. S. entomological commission, 2x.

Loc. cir. 23.

Loc. cir. 36.

466 /’SY’CH’. [June x893.

cus tu3erculatus Beauv., hibernates asa larva and reaches maturity about MayISt.Dr. Cyrus H. Thomas in I87r de-

scribed* a form of S. americana underthe name of Acridium am3iuum andstated that in southern Illinois it alwaysappears in small numbers in April orMay while americana never appearsearlier than the middle of July. Inanother place- he says of am3iguum""It is this variety which appears occa-sionally to pass the winter in the perfectstate." The specimens in my possessionmay be his var. ambiguum but as faras I can see they do not differ either instructure or color from specimens ofthe typical americana taken in thisvicinity in October.McNeill says of S. americana, that

its earliest recorded appearance at RockIsland, Illinois, is Sept. 2oth, whileScudder records its capture at FortReed andJacksonville,Florida, on AprilIOth. This comprises all the infor-

mation at hand as to dates of appear-ance at other places.That the species is, to a certain ex-

tent, migratory is well known, numer-ous instances of this habit having beenrecorded by Riley,* Thomas, and otherwriters;but these migrations all oc-curred in late summer or in autumn.

Its unexpected appearance here soearly in the season gives rise in mymind to the following questions Where,if at any place, in the United States doesit hibernate as imago? Is it double ortreble brooded in such a locality? Atwhat point southwest of Terre Haute,Indiana, does it occur mature as early asApril I2th in sufficient abundance thatit could be blown in numbers and scat-tered over the streets of this city? Inthis locality it is evidently doublebrooded, the first brood maturing inJune or July from eggs hatched inspring, the other maturing in Septem-ber or October.

HOSTS OF NORTH AMERICAN TACHINIDAE, ETC., I.

BY C. It. TYLER TOWNSEND) LAS CRUCES, :N. MEX.

The following twenty-seven speciesof tachinids, sarcophagids, etc., wereall bred by Prof. S. A. Forbes, in Illi-nois. They were included in a largecollection of Muscidae sent to me fordetermination from the Illinois State

* U. S. geol. surv. of Montana, 87, 447.Psyche, VI, 73.Ninth Rep. st. ent Ill., x88o, 33.Proc. Bost. soc. nat. hist., XIX, 86.

Laboratory of Natural History atChampaign.

r. Cistogaster immaculata Mcq.One bred fl’om Leucania uniybuncta.

2. Ocy2btera euchenor Wlk. Onebred from "Acrididae." Also one(smaller specimen) from Leucaniaun3uncta.

First Rep. U. S. ent. comm., 449.

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