NOTES. \i^ 



Quite recently Dr. Oudemans* has returned to this subject, 

 having ascertained that the existence of an acarid chamber in 

 wood-boring bees had been noticed many years ago. 



Of late years, as indicated above, this example of symbiosis was 

 discovered in February, 1898, by Mr. Green, who found it in two 

 species of Oojjtort/ioso/na, G. teii'aiscapa and G. Or i/or Ufu, occurTinii 

 in Ceylon, and sent specimens to Colonel Bingham, the well- 

 known hymenopterist, and to Mr. A. D. Michael, the acarologist in 

 London, but did not publish his discovery. Quite independently, 

 in October of the same year, Mr. Perkins made the same observa- 

 tion and published the paper on the subject quoted above. Dr. 

 Oudemans points out that Mr, Perkins was therefore the " oiiicial 

 discoverer" so far as the present incident is concerned. 



Dr. Oudemans, however, has since unearthed earlier records of 

 this form of symbiosis in various journals, proceedings, and 

 archives of societies in Holland. In 1856 R. T. Maitland, a 

 Dutch entomologist, described an abdominal sac in Xylocopa 

 (Coptorthosoma) latipes containing acarid parasites, which he 

 named Gainasus saccicola. Still earlier, in 1846, a similar instance 

 was described by H. Zollinger, the bee-host being probably refer- 

 able to Coptort/iusofua cestua/ts and the acarid parasite a species 

 of Trichotai'suii. 



Finally, the observation goes back to the year 1839, when Herr 

 Brilman recorded somewhat vaguely the occurrence of mites in 

 the abdomen of wood-boring bees. 



Between 1856 and 1898 the phenomenon appears to have been 

 overlooked, a circumstance which illustrates how effectually an 

 interesting and important biological observation may be buried 

 in a publication unless it is followed up and placed in a category 

 with analogous facts drawn from other sources. 



End of Vol. T. 



* A. C. Oudemans. Symbiose von, Ooptorthosoma und Greenia. Eine Priori- 

 tatsfrage. Zool. Anz. Bd. XXVII., December, 1903, pp. 137-139. This paper 

 contains further bibliographical references. 



