THE FAUNA OF "RESERVOIR-PLANTS." 193 



Mention must also be made of a new species of Tingitid Bug 

 {Leptostyla gibbifera, Picado, op. cit., p. 303), of which great 

 numbers were found in certain bromelias by Picado. These 

 insects feed on the plant, inserting their buccal stylets into its 

 tissues. They remain thus motionless for hours at a time, and 

 it frequently happens that they are caught and held by a gum 

 secreted by the plant, as the result of the wound made by the 

 insect. When thus held fast, one of two fates may attend them : 

 either they may perish, engulfed in the gum ; or, if they survive 

 the hot hours of the day, they may be liberated by the melting 

 of the gum at evening, when it receives moisture from the 

 atmospheric condensation. The greater number of those which 

 are thus held gummed to the leaves are immature, and these 

 immature specimens are armed with a number of ramifying 

 spines of rather terrifying appearance (see Picado's figure). As 

 the insects must be absolutely at the mercy of their enemies 

 while thus held fast, these spines might be regarded as a means 

 of defence. But examination shows that each branch of these 

 spines bears at its apex, not a sharp point but a transparent 

 and very delicate vesicle. Unless the vesicles contain some 

 irritant, such fragile structures must be of doubtful protective 

 value.* 



Speaking more generally, the creatures normally frequenting 

 bromelias derive their sustenance directly or indirectly from the 

 plants. Some are phytophagous, attacking the plant itself: 

 among these are certain Coleoptera, Acari, Hemiptera, some 

 Orthoptera, larva? of Lepidoptera, &c. Others are saprophagous, 

 feeding on debris ; such are Cockroaches and Earwigs, Milli- 

 pedes, Pseudoscorpions, and Isopod Crustacea. Others again 

 are predatory ; among these are Peripatus, Scolopendrid Centi- 

 pedes, Batrachians, Spiders, and many more. Some of the 

 Spiders spin webs above the surface of the water in the com- 

 partments of the plant, in such away as to catch winged insects 

 when they emerge from their aquatic nymphs and take flight ; 

 other bromelicolous Spiders chase their prey in the open — such 

 are the numerous Salticids. 



Origin and dissemination of the bromelia-fauna. — There are 



* Picado stales that he has also observed the young of another Tingitid 

 similarly gummed to the leaves of Euphorbiacece of the genus Croton. 

 Zool. 4th aer. vol. XVIII.. May, 1914. q 



