Ethological Observations on Some Pyrrhocoridæ of Cuba.* (Hemiptera-Heteroptera).

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Abstract
The cotton-stainers or bugs of the Pyrrhocorid genus Dysdercus are already the subject of an extensive literature. The curtailment of their activities is a frequent task of the applied entomologist in the tropics. The studies here reported on Cuban cotton-stainers and their relatives were made from a point of view which has rarely been previously engaged with these insects. At Soledad, Cuba, where the writer was privileged under an E. F. Atkins Harvard Fellowship to spend most of February, March and April, 1925, no Malvaceous crops of importance are grown, and for this simple reason, cotton-stainers present no very pressing economic problem. So far as the limited time allowed, and in the intervals of other work, their life-histories were studied for their intrinsic interest to the Hemipterist, and their general ethology investigated with regard to its possible bearing on the theory of warning colouration. On both counts the results are very incomplete, and it should be especially emphasised that they were all gained under dry season conditions. Wet season experience would perhaps modify some of the conclusions drawn, and would almost certainly show the cotton-stainers associated with other plants.

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