THE PHILIPPINE 



Journal of Science 



D. General Biology, Ethnology, 

 AND Anthropology 



Vol, VIII APRIL, 1913 No. 2 



A STUDY OF CAPRIFICATION IN FICUS NOTA 



By C. F. Baker 



(From the College of Agriculture, University of the Philippines, 



Los Bancs, P. I.) 



Four text figures 



It is a well-known fact in horticulture that Smyrna figs can 

 be produced only through the agency of certain minute insects 

 of the superfamily Chalcidoidea, which perform for the figs the 

 act of cross pollination. The careful investigation of this mar- 

 velous symbiotic relationship between plant and insect was due, 

 in the first instance, to European scientists. Americans in Cali- 

 fornia took careful account of all the facts involved, in their 

 introduction of the Smyrna fig into that State, building up there 

 business involving many thousands of dollars, all hanging* on 

 the successful pollinating operations of these minute insects.- 



Observations were later extended to various wild figs, many 

 new and strange forms of fig insects were described, and in some 

 cases attempts made to trace the details of the symbiosis, as for 

 instance by Cunningham on Ficus roxburghii in India.- 



Superficial observations in Cuba and in Brazil had previously 

 indicated to me very definitely the astounding extent and the 

 very varied possibilities of this subject. The number of known 

 species of figs is said to be above five hundred. In many of 

 these the character of the caprification phenomena varies very 



■Eisen, Bull. Div. Pomol, U. S., Dept. Agr. (1901), No. 9. This bulletin 

 contains a full bibliography of the subject. 



-Ann. Royal Bot. Garden, Calcutta (1889), 1, 13-47, pis. 1-4. 

 116935 63 



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