MORPHOLOGICAL ADAPTATION IN INSECTS — GRANDI 217 



cording to my findings of 1934) clear involutional features such as 

 the disappearance of the antennal sensillae, general reduction of the 

 hairs and sensillae of the head capsule and of its appendages in num- 

 ber and length, transformation of the mandibles into little sclerotized 

 subconic organs, a reduced differentiation of the maxillae and sclero- 

 tized regions of the palatine and prepharyngeal integument, and so on. 



VI. ADULTS OF HYMENOPTERA CHALCIDOIDEA DEVELOPING 



IN THE RECEPTACLES OF FICUS L. 



(IDARNIDAE-AGAONIDAE) 



The embryonic and postembryonic development of these Tere- 

 brantia, at least as far as is known today, occurs within the pistillate 

 galligenous flowers of the receptacles of Moraceae belonging to the 

 genus Ficus L. The Agaoninae cause the parthenogenetic formation 

 of the endosperm (on which their larvae will feed) in the host-plant 

 flowers, wherein they put at the same time with the egg some drops of 

 the secretion of a gland attached to the female genital terebra. The be- 

 havior of the Sycophaginae is unknown. As regards the Idarnidae, 

 the facts I discovered concerning the genus Philotrypesis Forst. have 

 made it clear that the development of these Chalcididae depends indi- 

 rectly on the preceding intervention of an agaoninous.* 



The females, after eclosion in the collective fruits (i.e., galls) 

 where they developed, may pass their imaginal lives : (a) completely 

 outside the receptacles in the species which lay eggs outside the in- 

 florescences after they have left, as far as is known, through the 

 ostiolar canal (almost all Idarninae) ; (b) partly outside, from the 

 time of their coming out of the ripe collective fruits through the ostio- 

 lar canal, straining its soft phyllomes, or through the receptacle walls, 

 to the time of going into the successive inflorescences, again through 

 the ostiolar canal, wedging themselves into the resistant, turgid, imbri- 

 cated phyllomes and partly within the receptacles, from this time up 

 to death, for the species, which in order to lay eggs must pene- 

 trate into inflorescences, where they will die after oviposition 

 (Agaoninae). 



The males, after their eclosion which occurs likewise within the 

 collective fruits (i.e., the galls) where they developed, may spend their 

 imaginal lives : (a) outside the receptacles, after emerging as do the 

 females through the ostioles ; but these homeomorphic winged forms 

 constitute only a small minority (some Idarninae and Sycophaginae) ; 



* What I have found since 1921 in regard to this matter has recently been 

 confirmed by K. J. Joseph (1956-1957). 



