A. E. Verrill — The Bermuda Islands. 



743 



Peach-fly ; Peach-maggot. (Ceratitis capitata Wied., as Trypeta.) 

 Figure 92. 



This small &y, whose larva lives in the flesh of the peach, orange, 

 and other fruit, is very destructive. Its ravages have caused the 

 cultivation of the peach, formerly abundant, to be almost entirely 

 abandoned. 



This peach-pest was first recorded from Bermuda by Messrs. C. 

 V. Riley and L. O. Howard* from specimens sent to them by C. W. 

 McCallan of St. George's, with an account of its ravages. The 

 article cited gives a pretty full historical account of the insect and 

 excellent figures of the fly and its- larva. In the same volume, p. 

 120, they print another letter from Mr. McCallan, dated Aug. 6, 1890, 

 90 



Figure 90.— Onion-fly ; a, larva, nat. size; b, the same, enlarged; c, imago, 

 enlarged 3 times ; after Packard. Figure 92. — Peach-fly {Ceratitis capi- 

 tata); a, imago; b, larva, both x3; after Eiley. From Webster's Inter- 

 national Dictionary. 



giving farther details of its habits. According to him, it was not 

 then known to injure oranges and other citrus fruits in Bermuda, 

 though it does so in other countries, but it was very destructive to the 

 peaches, the larva? boring in the pulp in large numbers and causing 

 the fruit to fall. He says that the same or a similar larva attacked 

 the loquat and Surinam cherry in the same way. He also mentioned 

 finding the fly on the leaves and fruit of the lime, and on grape 

 vines. He states that they had then been known in Bermuda for 

 about 25 years. In Madeira, the Azores, Cape Verde Islands, Malta, 

 Mauritius, etc., a fly, supposed to be the same species (described by 

 Macleay, 1829, as C. citriperda), is very destructive to oranges, 

 causing them to fall when about half grown. It might easily have 



* See Riley and Howard. A Peach Pest in Bermuda, Insect Life, iii, p. 5. figs. 

 1, 2, Aug., 1890 ; also, vol. iii, p. 120, 1890. 



