Vol. LI. LONDON. OCTOBER, 1919. No. 8 



POPULAR AND PRACTICAL ENTOMOLOGY. 



Collecting Terrestrial Arthropods ix Barbados and Antigua, British 



West Indies. 



by dayton stoner, iowa city, iowa. 



(Continued from p. 178.) 



II. ANTIGUA. 



The island of Antigua is situated in latitude 17° 6' N., and is the principal 

 island of the Leeward group of which it is the political capital. It is roughly 

 oval in outline, twenty-four miles long by about fifteen broad, with an area of 

 108 square miles and a population of about 36,000. The central part of the 

 island is low and flat and the soil more or less clayey; the southern and south- 

 western parts, in the vicinity of English Harbour, where a large share of the 

 collecting was done, are volcanic and mountainous and covered, in many places, 

 with dense forests. The greatest elevation is about 1,500 feet. To the north 

 and northeast the soil is composed of calcareous marls and coarse sandstones. 



Extended periods of drought often visit the island, and the average annual 

 rainfall is a little less than fifty inches. As a result of the nature of the soil and 

 the protracted dry periods the uncultivated vegetation is largely of a xerophytic 

 nature. However, the soil where it can be worked at all is fertile and retains 

 well the small amount of moisture. Sugar is the principal industry although 

 corn, yams and pineapples are cultivated on a small scale. 



Antigua is not under so high a state of cultivation as is Barbados; neither 

 is it so thickly populated as that island ; natural enemies of insects are not 

 numerous — all these conditions make for a more abundant and varied insect 

 fauna than we found at Barbados. 



The majority of native Antiguans living in the rural districts and small 

 villages are extremely poor, but they are neither so inquisitive nor so insistent 

 on offering their services in collecting specimens as are the Barbadian negroes. 

 This was a great relief to us, and much less trying on our temper and vocabulary. 



While the Imperial Department of Agriculture maintains some of its activi- 

 ties on Antigua there is at present no resident entomologist, and we came upon 

 none of the inhabitants of the island who were particularly interested in ento- 

 mology as a science. 



Of the lower forms of terrestrial Arthropods, scorpions and tarantulas, as 

 well as other forms of Arachnids, are abundant. In low- wooded areas, under 

 dried leaves, we found considerable numbers of a large brachypterous cock- 

 roach, but in reaching out to seize these agile fellows it was necessar\- 

 for the collector to look sharply in order to make sure that a scorpion or two 

 did not lurk close enough to be dangerous. Centipedes are not uncommon in 

 moist places. 



In addition to the large cockroach above mentioned, two other forms, 

 Periplaneta aiistralasice and P. americana are also very common. A greater 



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