TKOCEEDINGS OF THE THIRD ENTOMOLOGICAL MEETING 553^ 



When cleared with KOH and mounted in Balsam, it appears 

 ovoid with the antennae, legs, mentum, rostral setae, and the anal lobes 

 distinct. 



The male puparium lies on the shoots near the eggmasses of females 

 or away on the curled leaves. It is covered with a thin whitish floss 

 and is very much Uke the male puparium of P. hirsutus excepting that 

 it is dark-brown in colour v>^ith the antennae addressed fronto-laterally. 

 The male is a fragile castaneous brown insect with a pair of broad 

 mealy wings. Its antennae and legs are Ught stramineous. They 

 emerge in numbers from August to end of October. The winter is 

 passed in the egg and nymphal stages though females are also to be 

 seen, but the majority of them lie quiescent after having laid the eggs. 

 This year I found a full-developed male lying by the side of empty eggs 

 on the 27th January 1919. The male had fully developed wings and 

 a pair of anal cretaceous white threads and would possibly have 

 emerged had not the temperature gone down. At the time of writing 

 this note (5th February 1919), it is lying by the side of a female ovisac 

 from which the eggs are emerging in large numbers. 



The nymphs and the gravid females, as well as those which have 

 laid eggs, are parasitized by three species of Chalcididae. As already 

 stated above, the parasitized nymph turns deep black-brown in colour 

 and swells up into a miniature cylinder with both the ends flattened. 

 When the adult parasite emerges it pushes out the cap over one end 

 and escapes. A parasitized female ceases to lay eggs and if parasitized 

 when the egg-laying has not been completed the mass of eggs remains 

 uncovered with the whitish cottony threads forming the female ovisace. 

 I have not up till now found any parasites either on the eggs or the- 

 adults. Numbers of Scymnus nubilans grubs may be seen present in the 

 midst of eggmasses and burrowing below these to reach the female. The 

 grubs have not hitherto been seen devouring the eggs although a few 

 eggs may be seen lying spoiled here and there. The Scymnus grubs 

 have been noticed to exhibit an especial Hking for the females whom 

 they try to reach by burrowing inside or through the eggmasses even. 

 In one case an eggmass showed no presence of a Scymnus grub within, 

 but when it was opened up a Scymnus grub was found within burrowing 

 through the eggs to reach the female (13th August 1918). From August 

 to October a number of adult Scymnus nubilans was seen on the leaves 

 as well as on affected cotton shoots and this period represents the 

 maximum activity of the cotton mealy-bug P. corymhatus. During 

 the last season, 1918-19, it was found that P. corymhatus was present 

 in large numbers on the cotton and on soy beans and the number of 

 P. hirsutus was less. But by the beginning of November the majority 



