Wing-Dimorphism in Cymindis Cribricollis Dejean and C. Neglecta Haldeman (Coleoptera: Carabidae)

(excerpt) One hundred and forty-nine specimens of Cymindis cribricollis Dejean and fifteen specimens of C. neglecta Haldeman from Quebec were examined for wingdimorphism

Carabid Beetles (Coleoptera: Carabidae) as Prey of North American Frogs

In this paper, 62 species of carabid beetles are listed as prey of frogs. Records are from the literature and a stomach contents study. During the period May to October 1973, I collected and examined the stomach contents of 2 bullfrogs, 45 green frogs, 504 northern leopard frogs and 7 wood frogs from southern Quebec in order to learn whether carabid beetles are major or minor prey of frogs

Notes on the Food of Cychrini (Coleoptera: Carabidae)

In this paper, the food of nineteen species of Cychrini is given, for three genera: Cychrus, Scaphinotus and Sphaeroderus. The beetles of this tribe seem to be nearly exclusively carnivorous, feeding principally on snails and slugs, exceptionally on insects and vegetable matter. The head is narrow and prolonged; the mandibles are elongate and prominent, with two acute median teeth in outer half, apparently well adapted for entering the opening of a snail shell. The beetles may be useful in keeping down harmful molluscs. The purpose of this study was to compile a list of data on the food of some Cychrini, from the literature and observations in the field. Almost all species live in forest country and appear to be nocturnal. Cychrus caraboides Linne, Cychrus dufouri Chaudoir, Scaphinotus bilobus Say and Sphaeroderus lecontei Dejean have been noted searching for food on rainy days

Conditional Restricted Boltzmann Machines for Structured Output Prediction

Conditional Restricted Boltzmann Machines (CRBMs) are rich probabilistic models that have recently been applied to a wide range of problems, including collaborative filtering, classification, and modeling motion capture data. While much progress has been made in training non-conditional RBMs, these algorithms are not applicable to conditional models and there has been almost no work on training and generating predictions from conditional RBMs for structured output problems. We first argue that standard Contrastive Divergence-based learning may not be suitable for training CRBMs. We then identify two distinct types of structured output prediction problems and propose an improved learning algorithm for each. The first problem type is one where the output space has arbitrary structure but the set of likely output configurations is relatively small, such as in multi-label classification. The second problem is one where the output space is arbitrarily structured but where the output space variability is much greater, such as in image denoising or pixel labeling. We show that the new learning algorithms can work much better than Contrastive Divergence on both types of problems

Transient Health Shocks and Agricultural Labor Demand in Rice-producing Households in Mali

Malaria and other transient illnesses have been recognized as factors constraining economic development in tropical countries. The purpose of this paper is to determine the direct and the indirect impact of transient illness shocks, caused primarily by malaria but also including other tropical illness, on family labor use in irrigated rice production in Mali. Family labor is the most important factor of production used in rice production in Mali and transient illness shocks may negatively impact labor supply, production and hence household welfare derived from agricultural income and consumption. Two labor demand models are estimated to determine whether illness does indeed reduce labor supply: one where the dependent variable only includes family labor and a second that combines family and hired labor. These models can be used to test two sets of hypotheses on the relationship between illness and labor supply. First, we hypothesize that short-term transient illness shocks affect household labor supply implying that intrahousehold coping mechanisms are not wholly effective. Secondly, we hypothesize that hired labor markets are ineffective in mitigating illness shocks. We find that direct and indirect health shocks reduce the effective supply of labor and that neither household nor market supply of labor can mitigate these shocks.D1, I0, Q12, Crop Production/Industries, Labor and Human Capital,