No. 11. — Two new species of Ascodipteron. 

 By Frederic Muir. 



One rainy evening in July, 1908, when sitting on the veranda of the 

 Hotel in Amboina, two bats (Miniopterus schreibersi) came flying 

 round after the insects attracted by the light and shelter. Wishing 

 to procure specimens of Nycteribiidae I caught them in my insect 

 net. Upon examining them I observed a Streblid (Nycteribosca 

 amboinensis Rnd.), crawling over their bodies in great numbers, 

 and turning back the long fur around the head, I found at the base of 

 the ear, a small swelling with a minute white body protruding from 

 the side (Plate 1, fig. 1). Dissected out of its host the flask-like shape 

 of the protruding white body revealed it to be the imbedded female 

 of a species of Ascodipteron (Plate 1, fig. 2). 



Wishing to learn more about this interesting insect, and if possible, 

 to procure the larva and male, I told my collector to bring me as many 

 bats as he could catch. During the course of a couple of weeks I 

 examined over one hundred bats consisting of five or six species. 

 I soon notice that only one species of bat (Miniopterus schreibersi) 

 was attacked by the Ascodipteron, twenty-eight per cent of them 

 being infested by this parasite. Most of the Nycteribiidae and 

 Streblidae were also found upon the same species of bat. It is pos- 

 sible that the bats can scratch the Ascodipteron out as I found several 

 with the skin broken at the base of the ear; or they may help one 

 another to rid themselves of their parasites, as I have often seen bats 

 resting side by side biting among their-.neighbor's fur. 



That the several species of Pupipara infesting bats in this part of 

 the world are not the rare insects that they are stated to be elsewhere, 

 is shown by the following list. 1 



1 Lipoptena tolisina and Penicillidia progressa are Dr. Speiser's manuscript names 

 and will be described together with the new species of Listropodia. 



