318" JOURNAL OF ECONOMIC ENTOMOLOGY [Vol. 10 



MEDITERRANEAN FRUIT-FLY (CERATITIS CAPITATA WIED.) 

 BREEDS IN BANANAS 



By Henry H. P. Severin, Ph. D. 



In an article entitled, "Banana as a Host Fruit of the Mediterranean - 

 Fruit-Fly," Back and Pemberton (1, p. 802) "seriously question the 

 statement" made in one of my publications (6, p. 70) that the "fruit- 

 fly was also bred from a half-ripe banana under field conditions." 

 Four scientists have bred the Mediterranean fruit-fly from bananas. 

 Back and Pemberton, however, endeavor to cast doubt upon the re- 

 sults obtained by three of these naturalists. The reader is entitled to 

 the data which I shall quote from scientific journals and correspond- 

 ence. 



My seriously questioned statement, that the "fruit-fly was also 

 bred from a half -ripe banana under field conditions," was published 

 in an article (6) which was read in more expanded form before the 

 American Association of Economic Entomologists. Since the editor 

 of the Journal of Economic Entomology, in which this article was 

 published, requested me to give a brief summary of the paper read, 

 the sentence in question was condensed from several statements pub- 

 lished in an earlier and more detailed paper (5) . 



I quote verbatim the statements which were published in my sum- 

 marized paper (6): "In the last number of the Journal of Economic 

 Entomology, V, No. 6, pages 443-451, we published a paper entitled, 

 'Will the Mediterranean Fruit-Fly {Ceratitis capitata Wied.) Breed in 

 Bananas under Artificial and Field Conditions? ' There is no question 

 of doubt but that the Mediterranean fruit-fly will occasionally breed 

 in ripe and over-ripe bananas under Hawaiian conditions. The fruit- 

 fly was also bred from a half-ripe banana under field conditions." It 

 is evident that I referred the reader in my summarized paper (6) to 

 the earlier and more detailed paper (5). 



I now quote the statements which were published in our earlier and 

 more detailed paper (5, p. 448): "During the mosquito campaign, 

 when the banana trees were cut down in Honolulu, hundreds of bunches 

 of bananas were examined to see if there was any evidence that the 

 pest was breeding in bananas under field conditions. Hundreds of 

 bananas containing maggots were removed from these bunches and 

 placed in jars containing sterilized sand. From these bananas a small 

 number of Mediterranean fruit-flies, numerous specimens of an An- 

 thomyid, Acritochoeta pulvinata Grims.; two species of Ortalidse, 

 Euxesta annonoe Fabr. and Notogramma stigma Fabr., and a number 

 of species of Drosophilidse were bred. The fruit-flies were bred from 

 but two bananas, one of which when taken from the bunch was 



