BIOLOGICAL STUDIES OF FIGS. 967 



lar place lies between the nucleus of the fig ovary and the 

 integument surrounding it. If left anywhere else obser- 

 vation shows that the egg will not develop. In order to 

 accomplish this the wasp first alights on the stigma of the 

 fig flower. Then she extends her ovipositor and runs it 

 down through the canal which from the center of the 

 stigma leads through the whole length of the style to the 

 funnel or entrance to the ovary of the flower. This is 

 penetrated by the ovipositor and the egg is laid and se- 

 curely wedged in between the nucleus of the ovary and 

 the integument surrounding it. 



As soon as the egg is deposited, the ovipositor of the 

 wasp is withdrawn. The lower part of the canal is filled 

 by a filiform appendage of the egg, while the upper part 

 of the canal fills with a brown exudation from the 

 wounded cells. As soon as one egg has been laid, the 

 wasp immediately departs to another flower there to re- 

 peat the process. The egg depositing power of a wasp 

 is simply enormous, and one wasp is capable of laying an 

 e:gg in each of the many gall flowers of a fig. After the 

 eggs have been all deposited the Blastophaga endeavors to 

 regain the outside of the fig through the same way she 

 entered. But in this she rarely succeeds. Being by the 

 egg-laying process completely exhausted, she generally 

 succumbs before she regains her liberty and her dead 

 body may be found in the opened fig. The work of the 

 Blastophaga has not alone been that of depositing eggs. 

 Involuntarily she has rubbed against some of the female 

 flowers of the fig, and the pollen which adhered to her 

 body when she entered has been deposited on the stigmas 

 of these flowers. The eiifect of this pollination is the 

 development of seeds in the female flowers. This would 

 not otherwise have taken place without the aid of the 

 wasp, because the pollen from another fig could not very 



