142 



would set to make half a crop. As usual, however, in such years the 

 number of insects produced by the full crop of the preceding year has 

 been so great as to totally ruin the crop wherever spraying has not been 

 resorted to. 



SUCCESS OF A VEDALIA IMPORTATION. 



We have already noted the fact that a sending of VedtdiacardinallSj 

 which we made through Mr. Coquillett to Dr. Locking of Xelson, 

 Is^ew Zealand, who had been designated to us by Mr. E. Allan Wight, 

 arrived in good condition. We learn from the Xew Zealand Farmer of 

 August, 1892, that the insects multiplied very rapidly, ate all of the 

 Iceryas that were present at the original point of colonization and then 

 migrated to the neighboring gardens, clearing off the Iceryas as they 

 traveled. The success of this experiment was as marked in a small way 

 as was the California importation. 



Since receiving this number of the N'eiv Zealand Farmer we have 

 had the pleasure of a letter from Mr, Wight giving further details. 

 We quote a portion of the letter referring to this matter, and a second 

 paragraph referring to Mr. Wight's own sending of Vedalia from a local- 

 ity of great abundance at Whangarei, together with some comments 

 upon the new Vedalia mentioned on page 289 of the last volume of 

 Insect Life. Mr. Wight's explanation concerning the new species is 

 ingenious but it will require an examination from a trained student of 

 the Coccinellid^ to settle the matter. 



Dr. Locking gave me a full accoimt of your last successful sending of Vedalia to 

 Nelson, and I have also, since then, sent them a large consignment from Whangarei, 

 ■where I found them in millions. The Nelson people have held a meeting, at which 

 you have been very warmly thanked for your great kindness, and they have written 

 to inform me that Icerya is very fast disappearing from their orange and lemon trees 

 that were dying before. * » » 



I think I mentioned that I had successfully sent boxes of Vedalia cardinalis to New 

 South ^Yales, Victoria, and all over New Zealand. The harvest I found at Whangarei 

 was a rich one, sometimes a single shake brought over 200 into my umbrella. I 

 found that there were always a few Icerya eggs, those immediately under the 

 mother scale, that were imbedded in so fluffy a cotton that the little beetles could 

 not get at them, although starving, and Mr. French found that those I sent him 

 tried to eat the mealy bug(Dactylopius) and could not do so, because the flufl' clung 

 round their legs and jaws. I also found that a large proportion of the females came 

 out of the pupa red, without the black markings. I had often observed (as long 

 ago as 1832-'34) that certain Lepidoptera were deficient in the black markings and 

 that these were insects exposed to the sun in the pupa stage, and I always found the 

 deficiency most marked where I had bred the insects in wooden boxes (in the dark). 

 I tried the experiment with Vedalia and I found similar results, also most of those 

 I sent to Mr. Olliff were in the pupa state (in dark boxes), and he had a great num- 

 ber of specimens of these badly marked ones. The female pupa exposes more of 

 its inmate to the sun than the male, the weather, when I collected, was also very 

 cloudy. Mr. Olliff has taken these for an undescribed species and named them Nov- 

 ius tngJttii, taking Mulsant's original genus, and giving me credit for a new species, 

 but I think that he is wrong, and that it is just as I explain, but what struck me is 



