277 



During the first day the female is quiescent. After pairing the male 

 :^ies away, while the female flutters among the branches and deposits 

 her eggs. As reared in confinement, the eggs may be gathered from 

 the sides of the boxes within which they are deposited. The ordinary 

 yield of a single insect is two hundred. 



The yama-mai is a native of a hilly country, and thrives better in 

 similar localities. The Japanese raise them either upon scrub oaks or 

 upon cut branches of the same i)laced in jars of water in open sheds. 

 If raised upon the trees, scarecrows are placed in the tops to keep away 

 the birds and paste spread about the trunk to catch the ants. 



The species can readily be cultivated in this country. The only spe- 

 cial precaution necessary is care in the wintering of the eggs, and, if 

 reared in confinement, the selection of a locality free from mold, coob 

 with a free circulation of air, and not too dry, as this is the best for the 

 growing worms ; otherwise they are liable to an infectious disease, which 

 destroys them just before the period of spinning. It might be possible 

 to change the habit of this species so that it could be wintered in the 

 cocoon, but it is probable that such a change would aflect the quality of 

 the silk. It appears to me more likely that the establishment of a cul- 

 tivated stock of the American species, which should winter in the egg 

 and produce a summer cocoon, thus resembling the yama-mai in habit, 

 would afford a source from which a native staple might be reeled. 



I am led to this conclusion by the observation that those cocoons of 

 the Cecropia which when reelable contained dead worms, show con- 

 clusively that change by cultivation is necessary in order to utilize the 

 native species. 



The secret of success in silk culture is in knowing the nature of the 

 insect, and failures regarding foreign species are due to an attempt to 

 introduce, not adopt or naturalize, them. A purely native silk can be 

 produced, and the cultivation of such a stock would be the best founda- 

 tion for a silk industry. Understanding must be the parent of skill. 

 Domestication of the native and acclimatization of foreign must precede 

 the cultivation of a useful product. 



NOTES ON A SPECIES OF BRYOBIA INFESTING DWELLINGS. 



By F. M. Webster. 



For the last two years, during spring, there have appeared in a num- 

 ber of residences in La Fayette, Intl., great numbers of small, active, 

 brown mites, which, while apparently doing no harm, created much con- 

 sternation among the painstaking housewives. 



There are a number of species of Bryobia in this country, two of which 

 (B. pratensis and B. pallida) were described by Mr. H. Garman as in- 

 festing meadows in Illinois,* but the present species appears to be unde- 

 scribed. 



'Fourteenth Report State Entomologist III, pp. 73 and 74. 



