Dec, '12] SEVERIN AND HARTUXG: MEDITERRANEAN FRUIT FLY 449 



citrus fruit present at this time of the year. The fact that the females 

 were actually observed stinging the lemons, suggested the idea that 

 the flies might deposit their eggs in bananas when this fruit was sus- 

 pended among the branches of the lemon trees. Hundreds of green 

 Chinese bananas, in bunches from 2 to 6, were hung in lemon trees for 

 8 days. From onl}- two of all of these bananas did we succeed in 

 breeding fruit flies and from these, 8 males and 5 females were obtained; 

 these bananas, when taken down from the lemon trees, were yellow 

 with black or decaj'ed areas in the peel. Dozens of ripe bananas Avith 

 the peel intact were suspended for two days among the branches of 

 lemon trees, and from all of these bananas there were but two from 

 which we were able to rear the adult fruit flies. From these two fruits 

 3 males and 1 female were obtained. From an over-ripe banana with 

 the peel entirely black and which had remained in the lemon trees 

 for two days, 1 male was bred. 



In a discussion over the results of this paper before Dr. A. J. Cook, 

 E. K. Carnes, F. Maskew, E. 0. Essig, and H. A. Weinland, officers of 

 the California State Commission of Horticulture, Mr. Weinland who 

 is connected with the fruit fly work in the Hawaiian Islands gave his 

 results of an experiment which he performed with the Mediterranean 

 fruit fly and these results he has kindlj^ permitted me to publish. In 

 his experiment, bananas were suspended in an orange tree which had 

 been stripped of its fruit; the tree was then covered with cheese cloth 

 and the fruit flies were allowed to emerge from infested fruit within 

 this tent. He claims that the pest was bred from ripe bananas with 

 the peel intact and also from ripe bananas with a portion of the peel 

 removed. 



Although the fruit flj' has been bred under field conditions from ripe 

 and over-ripe bananas with the peel intact, Mr. F. INIuir of the Hawaiian 

 Sugar Planters' Experiment Station in a discussion on this subject 

 raised a point worth mentioning. This point was that the tannic 

 acid in bananas decreases in strength when the fruit is removed from 

 the bunches on growing trees and for this reason the field conditions 

 were not strictly natural conditions. 



Mr. George Compere has kindly called my attention to a bulletin 

 written by Kirk^ of New Zealand in which it is stated that the INIediter- 

 ranean fruit fly was actually bred from bananas and pineapples inter- 

 cepted at the wharf. 



This paper had been sent to Prof. E. P. Felt, editor of the Journal 

 of Economic Entomology, when we came across, in the library of the 

 University of Wisconsin, a reprint from the Journal of Agriculture 



1 Kirk, F. W. 1909. Fruit Flies. Bull. 22, Dep't of Agrie. New Zealand, p. 9. 



