1906.] 23 



Ci/cadecc, a pliiiit not unlike a dwiirf palm, with somewhat prickly 

 fern-like fronds four or five feet louu^, growing shuttlecock-fashiou 

 from a very short stem, and producing large "cones" of bright red 

 fruits, the hard kernels of which were formerly much esteemed as 

 food by the aborigines after due ])reparation. This plant is not 

 common near Sydney, but on March 9th, 1901, I found it at Woy 

 Woy, on the Hawkesbury estuary, growing in great abundance in 

 open sandy " bush." On the fronds a fine large brow^n Sagrid, Carpo- 

 phagus hnnhsicB, Mad., occurred in some numbers, as well as a curious 

 and very active little stout yellow and brown Buprestid, Xyroscelis 

 crocata, Lap. et Gory, without any of the metallic lustre of its allies, 

 and looking like a small splinter of wood at first sight ; I afterwards 

 found it freely on the Macroznmia at Fremantle, W. A. By searching 

 at the base of the fronds, among the young shoots which form a sort 

 of " heart," two very interesting weevils, Tranes sparsus, Boh., and 

 T. internafus, Macl., were found commonly, also a singular snow-white 

 Coccid {Dactylopius sp.) which secreted a large quantity of sticky 

 white wax, and was accompanied by a very pallid species of the 

 Nitidulid genus Bracliypejplus. I found the two latter insects subse- 

 quently in the Illawarra, in the heart of the " cabbage palm," Livis- 

 tona australis. 



The well known " Grass-trees " {Xanthorrhoea hastilis, R. Br., X. 

 australis, E. Br., &c.), the abundance and singular appearance of 

 which give a distinctive character to the drier parts of the Sydney 

 " bush," are, especially when dead and decaying, the exclusive habitat 

 of a number of very interesting CoJeoptera* The stem or trunk of 

 a " Black-boy," as the plant is often called, may attain a height of six 

 feet or more with a diameter of fully a foot, and when living it is 

 crowned with a great mop-like tuft of coarse rigid foliage, sufficiently 

 ilike grass to account for its popular name ; from this head protrudes 

 |a slender spike sometimes six feet long, crowded towards its end with 

 jvery numerous minute greenish-white, somewhat lily-like flowers. 

 iWhen dead, the trunk may be said to consist of a cylindrical core of 

 |an open fibrous texture, usually saturated with moisture, and about 

 jthree inches in diameter ; this is enclosed in a shell or case of a 

 I radiated structure, formed of the persistent bases of the leaves, per- 

 meated with the fragrant yellow resin of the plant, and almost always 

 ^Icharred on the outside by past bush fires. Between this outer case, 

 Which, when old, is easily demolished by a good kick, and the core, 

 %- " - 



* Cf. Froggatt, The Entomology of the Grass Trees, Proc. Linn. Soc. N.S. Wales, 1896, 

 f| pp. 73-87, pi. IX. 



