Cynips (aggregata) sierrae, new species
agamic form

GALL.-Large, up to 32. mm., averaging nearer 28. mm. in diameter, with a slender, drawn-out, sharply-pointed pedicel at base; pinkish rose to brownish tan and darker brown, only obscurely mottled with purple, some times with a bluish puberulence, occurring singly or (more often) in large clusters; the galls inserted in cracks in the bark of young twigs. Figure 88.

HOSTS.—Quercus sacame [arizonica], Q. chihuahuensis.

RANGE.-Durango: Patos, 15 W, 8000' (Q. sacame, Q. chihuahuensis). Zacatecas: La Mesa, 8000' (galls, Q. saca me). Aguascalientes: Pabellón, 20 W, 7,000' (galls, Q. rhodophlebia.). Probably occurring throughout the more central portion of the West ern Sierra of Mexico, although the determinations are certain only from Southwestern Durango. Figure 84

LIFE HISTORY. —Adults: Mature in galls in first half of November. Emerging November 13, 18, 19. December 30. January 15. February 5, 10, 15, 20, 22, 23, 25. March 2, 10. April 1. Most of the emergence in the first half of February, the emergence dates previous to the first of February and after the last of February applying to a few stray insects only.

We have bred the insect from the galls taken at only a single locality (west of Patos in more southern Durango), but we have galls of probably the same species from other and more southern locali ties in the Western Sierra. Our host records for Quercus sacame and Q. chihuahuensis may apply to one oak, for we were not able to make satisfactory differentiation of the two species in the field at this locality. Although both of the extreme types of oak were present, there also appeared to be every intermediate and recombination of the two types.

- Alfred Kinsey: (1936) Origin of higher categories in Cynips^©