262 Transactions. 



Art. XVIII. — Notes on the Destruction of Kumaras from the 

 Friendly Islands {Tonga), caused by an Imported Weevil, with 

 Descriptions of the Larva, Pupa, and Perfect Insect, &c. 



By Major T. Broun, F.R.E.S. 



[Rend before the Auckland Institute, V2th December, 1907.] 

 Plate XXII. 



During the years 1906 and 1907 I noticed numbers of imported 

 kumaras that had been badly perforated by weevils, so several 

 samples were secured and kept under observation in glass jars, 

 in order that the perfect insect might be reared and identified. 

 That operation was successful. 



It was very desirable that that tedious process should be 

 accomplished, because considerable quantities of kumaras might 

 be illegally condemned by some experts of the Agricultural De- 

 partment, who, no doubt, might imagine that the kumaras were 

 infested with the potato-moth (Lita solanella), which belongs to 

 an entirely different order of insects, and no more resembles the 

 weevil than chalk resembles cheese. Indeed, one of the local 

 importers assured me that such illegal condemnation had 

 actually occurred. 



Not only does this weevil attack kumaras, which is bad 

 enough when potatoes are scarce and dear, but I have also 

 reared it from island oranges. Here again the question of un- 

 authorised condemnation arises, as the only prohibited insects 

 are the Queensland fruit-fly (Tephrites tryoni) and the Mediter- 

 ranean species (Halterophora capita) ; but another fly, discovered 

 and described by me (Dacus xanthodes), which is just as destruc- 

 tive as the. Queensland species, though found as far back as 

 December, 1903, and afterwards reared in large numbers from 

 island oranges, mammsD-apples, grenadillas, and more rarely 

 from pineapples, has never been included in the schedule of the 

 Orchard and Garden Pests Act. 



The description of the fly (Dacus xanthodes) appeared on 

 page 327, vol. xxxvii, of the " Transactions of the New Zealand 

 Institute " for 1904, and also, what is more remarkable, on 

 page 306 of the report of the Agricultural Department for the 

 same year. 



