LIBRARY

786
COLLEGE ENTOMOLOGY
common European species. At least 12 species have been reared from the beet
leafhopper, Eutettix tenellus (Baker), in western North America. Of these
P. industrius Knab, P. similis Hough, P. subnitens Cresson, P. unguiculatus
Cress., and P. vagabundus Knab are the most important.
VI. Suborder SCHIZOPHORA Becker 1882
g. Series ARCHISCHIZA Enderlein 1936
Family CONOPIDlE (Leach 1815) Stephens 1829 (Con-op'i-dre, from the Greek
I{t"vwt/;, a gnat, mosquito). German, Dickkopf:fiiegen. Thick-headed Flies,
Wasp Flies.
Small to medium-sized, 4-10 mm., unusual, elongated, and often wasp-like
parasitic flies which are sluggish or active; bare, thinly pilose, or rarely slightly
bristly; somber black, reddish, or brown with yellow, white, or orange markings.
Head broader than thorax and with ptilinal suture. Eyes large. Ocelli present,
vestigial, or absent. Antennre porrect; arising from frontal extrusion; threesegmented,
the last segment enlarged; with dorsal, subdorsal. or terminal arista
CU1+Ma
FIG. 291. Wing of the conopid fly, Pltysocephaia affinis Williston.
or a pointed terminal style. Thorax somewhat humped. Wings hyaline or
dusky; anal cell closed. Abdomen may be constricted at base and wasp-like or
normally broad; genitalia large in both sexes and curved under body; ovipositor
may be well developed and in Stylogaster Macquart is longer than the body.
The eggs are peculiar in that they have small hooks or filaments for attaching
them to the bodies of the hOl'\ts. The larvre are highly specialized, broad, ovoid or
pyriform, with reduced mouth parts and the posterior spiracles screened and
with large convex plates. The pupre are enclosed in the last larval skin and have
a pair of anterior' and posterior spiracles. The adults are slow or rapid fliers and
some hover. They visit certain kinds of flowers, and those that have been ob·
served strike or oviposit on the host while in flight. The newly hatched larvre
burrow into the abdominal cavities of the host, develop as endoparasites, and
pupate within the carcass.
The family is a small one and contains about 500 species which are widely