SUMMER COLLECTING.--During the latter part of spring and throughout the whole summer, when the vegetation is fully developed, every possible collecting method can be carried on with success, so that the beginner hardly knows what particular method to use. There are stones to be turned over; old logs, stumps, and hollow trees to be investigated; newly felled or wounded trees to be carefully inspected; here a spot favorable for sifting claims attention; promising meadows and low herbage in the woods invite the use of the sweeping net; living or dead branches of all sorts of trees and shrubs to be worked with the umbrella; the mud or gravel banks of ponds, lakes, rivers, and creeks afford excellent collecting places; the numerous aquatic beetles are to be collected in the water itself; the dung beetles to be extracted from their unsavory habitations; in the evening the electric and other lights are to be visited, the lightning beetles chased on meadows and in the woods, or the wingless but luminous females of some species of this family to be looked for on the ground, and the trees and shrubs are to be beaten after dark in search of May beetles and other nocturnal leaf-feeding species which can not be obtained at daytime; and, finally, some of the rarest Scarabaeidae and some other species fly only late at night or again only before sunrise. In view of this embarrassing multitude of collecting opportunities in a good locality, the beginner is apt to be at a loss what course to pursue. Experience alone can teach here, and only an expert collector is able to decide, at a glance at the locality before him, what collecting method is likely to produce the best results, and his judgment will rarely be at fault. It is impossible to go into details regarding the various collecting methods, just mentioned, and only a few general directions can be given regarding those methods which have not previously been alluded to. _Collecting under Stones._--Turning over stones is a favorite method among beginners and yields chiefly Carabidae, the larger Staphylinidae, certain Curculionidae, and a multitude of species of other families. Stones on very dry ground are productive, only early in spring or in the fall, while those on moist ground, in the shade of woods, are good at all seasons. In the Alpine regions of our mountainous districts, especially above the timber line, collecting under stones becomes the most important method, and is especially favorable along the edges of snow fields. In often frequented localities the collector should carefully replace the stones, especially those under which he has found rare specimens. The neglect of this rule is one of the principal causes for certain rare species having become extinct in the vicinity of our cities.