14 president's address. 



eggs in the stem of the cane, and both the larvae and beetles feed 

 upon it. At some of the Fijian plantations, up to 30 per cent, of 

 the cane-crop has been damaged. At Sabasa, in 1908, three 

 shillings per thousand were paid for 8,000,000 beetles. 



Fruit-Flies. — Several species of the Family Trypetidoi are 

 causing enormous losses to the orchardists of the world. Two 

 species in Australia (Ceratitis capitata, the introduced Mediter. 

 ranean Fruit-fly, and our native, Queensland Fruit-fly, Dacus 

 Tryoni) have cost orchardists many thousands of pounds, through 

 their habit of depositing their eggs, by means of a needle-pointed 

 ovipositor, in the ripening fruit. In Italy, the allied species, 

 known as the Olive-fly {Dacus olere) was responsible for the loss 

 of £1,000,000 worth of olive-oil in 1906, through the damage it 

 caused to the ripening olives. 



Thi'ee grain- weevils (Calandra) infest enormous quantities of 

 stored grain in all parts of the world, but are naturally worst in 

 the warmer climates, where thousands of bags of wheat and 

 maize are rendered worthless by their presence. 



In flour-mills, we have another cosmopolitan pest known under 

 the name of the Mediterranean Flour-moth (Fphestia kuehnielln) 

 which lays her eggs amongst the dust and waste of the flour-mills, 

 the larvse getting into the shoots, elevators, etc., and webbing the 

 flour together with silken strands, until it forms great felted 

 masses, which interfere with the belts. This necessitates the 

 stopping of the mills to open out and clear away all these felted 

 masses, and means a large annual expenditure to every infested 

 mill. 



Yet these are only a few examples of the many insects that are 

 always at work, and have to be dealt with by the entomologist. 



The actual birthplace of economic entomology, as applied to 

 agricultural and horticultural pursuits, is the United States of 

 North America; while Canada, Australia, and South Africa have 

 taken up the work on very similar lines. It can be easily under- 

 stood that the great tracts now under cultivation, could not be 

 worked at a profit under the conditions of farming in Great 

 Britain and Europe. Large areas had to be put under crops, and 

 both planted and harvested as cheaply as possible. The almost 



