178 JOURNAL OF ECONOMIC ENTOMOLOGY [Vol. 9 



It becomes natural to ask why the success of the imported beneficial insects has 

 been so pronounced here, while in other countries it has been attained in a com- 

 paratively small measure. The reason, I think, is sufficiently obvious. The same 

 causes which have led to the rapid spread and excessive multiplication of injurious 

 introductions, have operated equally on the beneficial ones that prey upon them. 

 The remote position of the islands, and the consequently limited fauna, giving free 

 scope for increase to new arrivals, the general absence of creatures injurious to the 

 introduced beneficial species, and the equability of the climate, allowing of almost 

 continual breeding, may well afford results which could hardly be attained elsewhere 

 on the globe. The keen struggle for existence of continental lands is comparatively 

 non-existent, and, so far as it exists, is rather brought about by the introduced fauna 

 than by the native one. 



In commenting upon Mr, Perkins's paper, the writer, in his address 

 on "The Spread of Land Species by the Agency of Man," said: "Mr. 

 Perkins's reasons are all good, but he has not mentioned one prime 

 reason of success, and that is that the most successful of the imported 

 species have come from another portion of the same great faunal 

 region, while others have been received from the region most closely 

 allied, viz. the oriental." This was in connection with a discussion 

 as to the chances of acclimatization of insects brought from different 

 life zones. 



In connection with this discussion, by the way, I concluded: "It 

 is on the degree of simplicity of its life — the degree of simplicity of its 

 natural environment as a whole — that the capacity of a species for 

 transportation and acclimatization, even in a parallel life zone, 

 depends." Mr. H. S. Smith recently, in a letter in which he quotes 

 this sentence, very aptly writes: "It seems to me that the degree of 

 simplicity of the new environment is quite as important. If the 

 species introduced into Hawaii had encountered the complex relation 

 that Apanteles fulvipes did in New England, where it was attacked 

 by eighteen different species of secondaries as well as several predators 

 during the first generation, there might have been a different tale 

 to tell!" 



It must be pointed out in conclusion that while conditions in Hawaii 

 are extremely favorable for the reasons which Dr, Perkins formulated 

 so early in the game, the men in control of the work were fortunate in 

 themselves in the first place, and in having Mr. Giffard among them, 

 and fortunate in being able to financially support any promising meas- 

 ure; and were fortunate, also, in having Mr. Koebele and Dr. Perkins 

 at hand; and were fortunate later in being able to add to their forces 

 such men as Swezey, Muir, Silvestri, and Osborn, and now Fullaway; 

 and at the present moment Timberlake, with his admirable technique 

 and broad knowledge, is on the Pacific on his way to take up parasite 

 work under the combined auspices of the Sugar Planters' Association 



