68 RESULTS FROM GIPSY MOTH PARASITE LABORATORY. 



subject affects the mutter scarcely at all. We know now that the 

 primary parasites of the gipsy and brown-tail moths, if they become 

 established, will be subjected to the attack of native hyperparasites 

 to a varying degree in accordance with the closeness of their resem- 

 blance in natural aflfmities and habits to American species, but there 

 are among them a few which are so different from any American 

 species as to make it probable that they will largely escape undue 

 parasitism in America, much as the gipsy and brown-tail moths 

 have themselves escaped. This does not lessen the force of the 

 original contention at all materially. It has simi)ly served to separate 

 the secondary parasites into bad, worse, and worst, and has left them 

 as a group with about the same degree of odium attached as before. 



The separation of the several secondary parasites into groups in 

 accordance with their capabilities for evil has not always been easy. 

 As with the primary parasites, the importance of which can not be 

 inferred from the numbers which chance to be reared from the 

 imported material, the secondary parasites, which are the least 

 frequently encountered, may easily be the most to be feared. 



PerilaTTipus has never been abundant as a parasite of tachinids 

 in any of the imported material. So far as is directly indicated 

 by our notes and breeding records there is nothing in its life or 

 habits which would separate it from the minor and inconsequential 

 secondary parasites, of which there are many species. 



These 0})inions, formerly held, have been changed as a result of 

 the investigations into the life and habits of the native Perilampus 

 hyalinus. It was not known or suspected, in spite of the considerable 

 study which the fall webworm has received at various times and 

 by various entomologists, that this secondary was of any more 

 interest or importance than any other, but it is now evident that 

 species of this genus may become of the greatest importance as 

 hyperparasites. It is further indicated as a direct result of these 

 studies that the different species of Perilampus are likely to con- 

 centrate their attack upon the parasites of some particular primary 

 host instead of scattering their attack upon all of the very numerous 

 species of hymenopterous and dipterous parasites suitable in other 

 respects. Thus Perilampus hyalinus appears to be particularly a para- 

 site of the parasites of the fall webworm. It is possible that it will 

 never attack the parasites of the gipsy moth or the brown-tail moth. 

 Perilampus cuprinus, for all that is positively known to the contrary, 

 may similarly concentrate its attack upon the parasites of the gipsy 

 moth and the brown-tail moth and might become a factor of as 

 much importance in the natural control of these insects as Perilampus 

 hyalinus undoubtedly is in the control of VaricJiseta, 



