102 DESTRUCTIVE INSECTS OF VICTORIA : 



destructive a nature, and owing to the close proximity of 

 Went worth to Mildura and other of our Murray districts, 

 the pest is not unlikely to cross the river into our State. 



The report of the late Mr. OllifT, who was sent by his 

 Department on a special mission to the infested districts, 

 at which places he collected some most important facts 

 connected with the life history of the insect under notice, 

 is interesting. 



He says : " The scale insect here figured has recently 

 been found doing an immense amount of damage to the 

 various kinds of saltbushes, particularly to the plants 

 known as Rhagodia Jiastata and Atriplex nummularia at 

 Wentworth, in the western district of New South Wales. 

 Immense numbers of these valuable fodder plants have 

 for some time been dying in this locality. An investigation 

 that I made during the past month proved that the trouble 

 was due to the presence of a large scale insect, which on 

 subsequent examination was found to be a new species of 

 Pulvinaria, a genus of Coccidse, in which the adult females 

 construct a conspicuous cottony covering for their eggs, 

 technically called an oversac, at the period of gestation. 



" This insect was first observed and forwarded to Sydney 

 by Mr. D. A. Morgan, Inspector of Stock at Wentworth, 

 and at the time of my visit the oversacs, each containing 

 thousands of minute brownish-red eggs, were found in 

 vast numbers on almost every saltbush, over large areas 

 of country. Many of the bushes were literally covered 

 with the scale, and appeared when viewed from a distance 

 as if they had in some unaccountable way burst in masses 

 of intense white flowers. On one small plant alone I 

 counted more than sixteen thousand of these oversacs, 

 a number that must indicate an almost incalculable 

 quantity of eggs. 



" The fully-grown female is an active naked insect, 

 measuring less than a quarter of an inch in length, and it 

 is not until the insect fixes itself firmly to a twig of its food 



