DIRECTIONS FOR COLLECTING AND PRESERVING 

 SCALE INSECTS (COCCJDiE). 



By T. D. A. COCKERELL. 



Ento'hiologist of the New Mexico Agricultural Experiment Station. 



General directions for collecting and preserving insects have 

 been given in sncli admirable form by Doctor Charles Y. Riley, that 

 any further contribution to the subject might seem superfluous. But 

 Coccidae are so diiferent from other insects that they can not be treated 

 in the same way. Ordinary insect collectors, even when attempting to 

 obtain material in all orders, almost invariably ignore the Coccidse. 

 Thus, for example, innumerable collections have been made in Brazil, 

 South Africa, and the Malay Archipelago, some of them very extensive 

 and varied; yet the Coccidse of these regions are almost entirely 

 unknown. The writer has not the least doubt that he could find in a 

 single day in Rio Janeiro, Cape Town, or Batavia, more species of 

 Coccidfe than are at present known from either of the regions men- 

 tioned, with the possible exception of Brazil, whence several forms 

 have lately been sent by Doctor Von Jhering. He knows, in fact, 

 single gardens in Kingston, Jamaica, which contain more coccid 

 species than are recorded from either of these three regions. 



We are accustomed to pride ourselves on the scientific spirit exhibited 

 by the English-speaking races of the present day; yet Jamaica, one of 

 the oldest of English colonies, has not produced naturalists like Poey 

 and Gundlach, of Cuba. Considering our opportunities all over the 

 world, it is surprising, not that we have accomplished so much, but 

 that we have in so many directions failed to even see what was before 

 us. What we have seriously set ourselves to do has in almost every 

 case been done not only successfully but brilhantly; but our capacity 

 for ignoring whole classes of facts, so far from being peculiar to strictly 

 official circles, has manifested itself on every side. Thus it is that the 

 Coccidse, everywhere abundant in the Tropics, everywhere conspicuous 

 on, and injurious to, cultivated plants, have been regarded almost as if 

 they had no existence. 



Yet there is no group of insects so easily collected as the Coccidse. 

 None are more easily packed in a small space or sent through the mails. 

 A complete collection of the known neotropical species could easily be 

 put in a hand bag of very moderate size. 

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