350 APPLIED ENTOMOLOGY 



fly freely about among the trees. A fig is a hollow, thick, and fleshy-walled 

 receptacle in which are situated, thickly crowded over the inner surface, the 

 minute flowers. The only entrance into the receptacle (or fig) is a tiny opening 

 at the blunt free end of the young fig, and even this orifice is closely guarded by 

 scales that nearly close it. The eggs are laid by the females at the base of the 

 little flowers in certain figs. The hatching larvae produce little galls in which 

 they lie, feeding and developing. They pupate within the galls, and the wingless 

 males when they issue do not leave the interior of the fig, but crawl about over 

 the galls, puncturing those in which females lie, and thrusting the tip of the 

 abdomen through the puncture and fertilizing the females. The fertilized winged 

 female gnaws out of the galls, and leaves the fig through the small opening at the 

 blunt free end. She flies among the trees seeking young figs, into which she 

 crawls, and where she lays her eggs at the bases of as many flowers as possible. 

 But it is only the wild, inedible, or 'caprifigs' that serve her purpose. The 

 flowers of the cultivated Smyrna seem to offer no suitable egg-laying ground and 

 in them no eggs are laid. But as the female walks anxiously about inside the 

 fig, seeking for a suitable place, she dusts all the female flowers with pollen 

 brought on her body from the male flowers of the caprifig from which she came, 

 and thus fertilizes them. This process is called caprification. Without it no 

 Smyrna fig has its flowers fertilized and its seeds 'set.' It is the development 

 of the seeds with the accompanying swelling of the fleshy receptacle and the 

 storing of sugar in it that makes the Smyrna fig so pleasant to the palate. The 

 trees may grow large and bear quantities of fruit, but if the fig (really the fig- 

 flowers) are not caprified, the size, sweetness, and nutty flavor of the perfect 

 fruit are lacking. To insure caprification, branches laden with caprifigs con- 

 taining Blastophagas just about to issue are suspended artifically among the 

 branches of the Smyrna fig. Of course the female Blastophaga entering a 

 Smyrna fig and dying there leaves no progeny, for she lays no eggs. It is there- 

 fore necessary to maintain a plantation of caprifigs in or near the Smyrna orchard. 

 These bear three crops or generations of figs : one, the ' profichi,' ripening in the 

 spring; another, the 'mammoni/ ripening in the late summer; and the third, 

 or 'mammae' generation, which hangs on the tree through the winter. By 

 means of these successive generations of caprifigs a series of three generations 

 (or sometimes four) of Blastophaga appear each year." 



The great importance of the Superfamily Chalcidoidea to man does 

 not rest either upon the importance of its destructive members or upon 

 the Blastophaga, but on the enormous number of parasitic forms included 

 in the group. These work in various ways as has already been indicated, 

 but only one can be considered here. It is a parasite on various species 

 of butterflies, particularly the Cabbage butterflies, and is known as 

 Pteromalus puparum L., having no common name. 



This insect (Fig. 366) is probably a native of Europe. It was noticed 

 here about 1870 and is now present wherever its host insects occur and 

 frequently destroys great numbers of them. 



The adult has a green body about a tenth of an inch long. The 

 female punctures the chrysalids of the host and lays her eggs within the 



