INSECT CONTROL 311 



for supremacy, sanguinary as it is, is only the beginning 

 of what might occur in the open in Japan. Tyndarichus 

 and Pachyneuron (Hymenoptera) are both habitually and 

 essentially secondary parasites, and both prey not only 

 upon Schedius but upon each other with perfect impartiality. 

 Either might attack the surviving Schedius and be in turn 

 the victim of the other, and there is no apparent reason 

 why Schedius should not return to the fray and, by destroy- 

 ing its own secondary, start the battle all over again." 



This Schedius habit of ovipositing in the larvae of the 

 useful Anastatus mitigates considerably against its own 

 utility; in fact, one of the problems of this branch of 

 economic entomology is to sift the wheat from the chaff, 

 to encourage the purely beneficial insects to the exclusion 

 of those that may mitigate against their spread. 



Our last example, Apanteles fulvipes, was the first para- 

 site of the gipsy moth which it was attempted to import 

 into America, and one of the last to be liberated there. 

 The difficulties to be overcome in importing the little 

 Hymenopteron from Japan appeared, at one time, almost 

 insuperable ; but no mean assistance was rendered by the 

 Japanese entomologists, who have proved themselves past- 

 masters in the art of packing such tender and small fry as 

 parasitic insects in such a manner that they may survive 

 long and tedious journeys. 



Apanteles is a caterpillar parasite, the adult female 

 depositing her eggs beneath the skin of the active gipsy 

 moth caterpillars, at any stage. The eggs hatch within 

 the body of their host and live there till they become 

 adult, in from two to three weeks, then they work their 

 way through the skin of the still living caterpillar. When 

 they reach daylight each caterpillar immediately spins a 

 small white cocoon, and the moribund though still living 

 host never moves from the spot, and its appearance, sur- 

 rounded by and apparently brooding over the cocoons, is 

 peculiar and characteristic (fig. 100). The number of the 



